More Information..

OK, this is the post I've been trying to make since Friday. We've been very busy & I haven't been on the Internet all weekend. I wanted to give you some more information about what Bobby and I think will happen over the next few weeks...
On April 28th, we will go to Baltimore to see his oncologist at Hopkins. He will most likely recommend one or two things. We aren't sure if they will want to do a biopsy. Then, we figure within a week or two, they will want to start the Interleukin-2 treatments. The IL-2 is a form of Immunotherapy. We haven't been given official information from Bobby's doctors-this is just general information about this medication. From what we understand, Bobby will be admitted to the hospital and will be given the medication thru a central line IV. It is given every 8 hours. The medication makes you very sick. I have posted links to the left which refer to information that may be helpful. Then, 8 hours later, they hang another bag. The side effects are nasty and Bobby is not looking forward to any of this. If you get too sick from the side effects, they will move you to the ICU. The Interleukin-2 is given until your body can't take it any more. Then, you recover and they send you home for a week. When you are ready, they bring you back into the hospital and repeat it again. We were told that the first time, it takes around 9-12 doses and the second time the body is already warmed up so it only takes 5-6 doses before you can't take anymore. Some hospitals repeat this a third time.

After the 2 weeks (maybe a 3rd), they wait about a month and repeat the CT scan. The goal is that the tumors have shown improvement (or will have cleared). They said either this works well-or not at all. If it has worked, I THINK THEY SAID that they repeat the above process again. (I'm not sure about that one) If it doesn't work...then we are back to NIH for Clinical Trials. NIH has a big bag of (nasty) tricks. Melanoma sucks and is very hard to treat.