Quick Update

Hey folks! We thought it would be good to send out what we know concerning the MRI from earlier today. We won't have results until tomorrow but we do know the possibilities. The change in staging from a Stage 3 group 3 to a stage 3 group 2 changed the protocol for treatment. Instead of a standard 4 treatments and surgery the protocol is 2 treatments and surgery. That leaves us with three possibilities:
1) The tumor has been reduced to 49% or lower of its original size by the chemo thus no more treatments or surgery.
2) The tumor is reduced but not by over 50% percent and thus we will have surgery to remove more of the tumor.
3) The tumor is reduced but is still too large for surgery and so we will need more chemo.

Right now option 2 is the most likely but option 1 is possible. Option 3 is highly unlikely. Some of you may be wondering why we keep talking about 50% of the tumor instead of all of it. I don't know all the biology behind it, I get along far better with dead languages than cell structure, but here is what I do know. Neuroblastoma is a unique cancer in that if the cancer is contained in the tumor and you reduce the size of that tumor to 49% or lower of its original size, it will normally simply die over time (normal as in 87% of the time). There is a small chance of reoccurrence and thus Andrew will need to have scans periodically over the next couple of years but it is nearly impossible for this cancer, once it is reduced by that much, to do much more than grow very slowly. This is why the standard treatment protocol is to reduce the tumor to less than 50%.

We will post something more when we know it. Whatever the outcome the clear truth is that 9 weeks ago, to the day, we were scared we were going to lose our son; today we are looking at the possibility that this could all be over in a couple more weeks. He is called the Great Physician not because He can heal but because He does!