Well, we’ve moved from the Marriot to the Motel 6, but we still have the same quality of towels. We’ve changed rooms and are now in the old part of the hospital. Last night and this morning Mike did fine with his motor skills when prompted (squeezing fingers, pushing toes, holding up fingers, sticking out his tongue) but has had more difficulty with the verbal end of things. He has been sleeping a lot since yesterday’s surgery and has been having a difficult time answering some basic questions, so we’ve moved to what’s called “step down.” It’s a step down from ICU but a step up from where he was. They will monitor him a little more closely here.
Preliminary Report. The doctor can’t say with 100% certainty until we get the pathology report back from the biopsy, but it looks like Mike’s tumor is cancerous and what is known as glioblastoma. For those of you who knew Eric Schell, this is what he had. We really can’t make any decisions about what to do until we get that official report back, but I suspect we’ll end up at Duke if the doctor’s suspicions are correct. For those of you who don’t know, Eric was my boss before he passed away, and I remember from our conversations that he said Duke and some place in Texas were the most progressive in dealing with this particular type of tumor.
Mike is resting a lot and is still not able to verbalize well at this point, so I think it’s best to hold off on visits. As soon as I think he can handle some visitors, I’ll post it on the blog.
Preliminary Report. The doctor can’t say with 100% certainty until we get the pathology report back from the biopsy, but it looks like Mike’s tumor is cancerous and what is known as glioblastoma. For those of you who knew Eric Schell, this is what he had. We really can’t make any decisions about what to do until we get that official report back, but I suspect we’ll end up at Duke if the doctor’s suspicions are correct. For those of you who don’t know, Eric was my boss before he passed away, and I remember from our conversations that he said Duke and some place in Texas were the most progressive in dealing with this particular type of tumor.
Mike is resting a lot and is still not able to verbalize well at this point, so I think it’s best to hold off on visits. As soon as I think he can handle some visitors, I’ll post it on the blog.
Mike’s cousin found a great website that a long-term survivor of glioblastoma wrote. It’s a guide to help others who are diagnosed with the tumor. It is a little old but gives some good general information. There is a lot of misinformation out there on the web, so you do have to be careful about what you read. I was trying to create a link to this website on the sidebar of this blog, but the hospital network is blocking me from doing that for some reason, so I’ll just give the link here in case you want to read it: http://home.earthlink.net/~sdepesa
1 comment:
Hey guys. I just wanted to let you know that we are thinking of you and praying for you and your family. I can only imagine what you are going through.
Listen, this is obviously not my specialty area, but I have a father in my practice who is a survivor of GBM. He is several years out from his diagnosis. He was treated at Duke. If you think it would be helpful, I can call him and ask if I can give you his contact information for you to contact at your discretion. I understand that you may not wish to do this, I know how overwhelmed you probably are with all the information, but just let me know if yo think this could be helpful. He and his wife are very intelligent and well versed on the latest and greatest in the mainstream medical area as well as the homeopathic.
Please know that we love you guys and are ready to help support you in any way we can.
By His Stripes, We Are Healed
tye whitaker
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