New Medication Approved for Monday

We finally have some news about the next medication. Also, our blog hosting company (Godaddy) fixed some problems with the blog that kept people from being able to comment or send mail. Sorry if you were having troubles!

Karen’s doc at the Clinic managed to get insurance to approve Opdivo, which is an immunotherapy medication approved for some cancer types, but has not yet been approved for ovarian cancer. We’re grateful to both the doc, and our insurance (Medical Mutual of Ohio), who have both been wonderful to us. Clinical trials going on now suggest Opdivo can be effective against ovarian cancer. Here is a link with some info about the med. https://www.opdivo.com/advanced-hcc/about-opdivo/how-opdivo-works

We did ask for information on stem cell treatments and other opportunities at the clinic, and the doc is keeping his eyes open for other opportunities.

Monday is her first treatment with the new medication. The doc says that the side effects are less extreme than the chemo she has been on. I have a little concern that she’ll receive the new treatment about four hours from home, but this is only a first time worry. The former treatments didn’t really start showing side effects for a day, which gave us plenty of time to get home. Fortunately, if we do need to stay up in Cleveland, we are in the Hope Lodge system, and they’ve been great about putting us up. If we are able to drive, it’s not been too bad so far. It’s amazing how taking so many trips resets my internal definition of what a “long trip” is. The first few trips seemed to take forever, but now it’s more normal.

When we drive, Karen sleeps most of the time, and I’ve been listening to audio books. I’m an avid reader, and only recently started reading e-books, so audio books are a huge leap for me, especially when listening to books from author’s I’ve also read on paper (or tablet). The voices seem wrong for familiar characters, and sometimes it’s just badly done. Some friends suggested a series which we had not read, and we started fresh on audio books. Perhaps it’s because we had not read from the author on paper, or because it’s narrated very well, but we’re finding the series (Dresden Files) quite enjoyable. It’s “brain candy,” so we can go weeks without listening, and still usually pick right back up where we were. And since there are 16 or 17 books in the series (so far), there should be plenty of material for our trips up to the Clinic.

I’ll be sure to post next week to let everybody know how the treatment goes.