Topic: another newbie
Hi everyone, thank you for letting me post here. I've been lurking for a couple of weeks. just upfront, i tend not to capitalize when i post online - please bear with my laziness 
Dad (62) was diagnosed with stage IV pancreatic adenoCA (mets to liver, lung) 11/16/11. he was seen by dr. javle within 2 weeks of diagnosis and started on chemo. he's just completed cycle 4 of FOLFIRINOX and has done amazingly well.
when i say amazing, i mean it. his recent scan shows shrinkage or stability of all lung mets/mediastinal nodes, shrinkage of all liver tumors and clearing of nodes, and disappearance (!!!!!) of the rather large pancreatic tumor. the tumor is gone. dr. javle said he'd never seen anything like this, and that he'd had the radiologist read it multiple times. his official diagnosis is now listed as CCA. so here we are.....
he met with dr. vauthey this morning. at this time, he's got too much liver involvement for surgery to be an option, but they aren't discounting it for down the road if he continues to respond like a champ to chemo. they don't plan to alter his chemo regimen at all, even though this protocol isn't traditionally used for CCA. i'm actually upset that they were put through a surgical consult, knowing how much of the liver is involved, but i guess they are covering all their bases.
i'm a medical speech pathologist who has worked with a LOT of people with cancer and my husband is a physician, so we're very comfortable throwing around words like FOLFIRINOX and ANC and metastasis and whathaveyou. what i'm NOT comfortable with is that my dad has cancer. i'm more comfortable with his odds now than i was when the diagnosis was pancreatic primary, but still. it's so much harder when it's my dad as opposed to a patient i like.
sigh. i am happy to have found y'all. sorry to have, but glad. you get it.....
