Changes, pt. 2

Yesterday we went in, we thought, to start Dad's chemo. He is seeing a Mastocytosis specialist in Buffalo, so since it wouldn't be practical to drive to Buffalo and back every day for chemo treatments, they were supposed to be overseen by his oncologist here in Rochester.  Yesterday, we thought, was to set up the schedule and to get our questions answered.

Instead, this doctor said he thought that chemo was too intense, and we'd be doing more harm than potential good.  He wants to either do nothing, or try alpha interferon shots.  Doing nothing is not at all acceptable to Dad.  This disease progresses very slowly, but the thought of just letting it take him is not Dad's way at all.  So alpha interferon shots it is.  Both treatments, chemo and alpha interferon, have the same success rate - dismal about 30%, but it's doing something!

I still need to be here for a few weeks, though, as he gets used to the interferon.  The side effects are pretty brutal, especially the first few weeks.  They are self-injected shots, though, so no daily trips to the hospital - that will be nice.  And, if we decide we need to, we can always try chemo at a later time.  Now we're just waiting for health insurance approval, which hopefully will happen in the next day or two.

More yawning Riff Raff (with Kirby on the left)