We met today with Saxon Connor, my liver surgeon. He described various options, but the key next step is to see what the CT scan, scheduled for 2nd August, turns up. If it shows no more mets and shrinkage in the known ones then I am a candidate for surgery. My CEA has dropped again, to 4.0 now, which is consistent with the chemo doing its job.
If there is no reduction in tumour size, and most likely it would be growing, then I have about 15 months left to enjoy. This is worst case and in view of the CEA result, is highly unlikely.
Assuming a reduction then I can continue with the full 12 rounds of chemo (just done my 5th round) and then look at surgery, but this will cause some damage to my liver.
The other option, which we favour, is to finish this cycle of chemo, one more round to go, then take a break for a few weeks and have the lung tumor removed. Then about 4 weeks later have the liver tumour out, along with any other suspicious bits. Following recovery from surgery I would then have another 12 rounds of chemo.
The surgeon has booked an appointment for 4th August, by then my CT scan results would have been reviewed and he will have discussed my case with the oncologist and the cardio-thoracic team.
According to Saxon, I have a 20-30% chance of cure after this surgery and chemo, median survival is about 40 months.
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