I just got back from my appointment with the haematologist. Dr D'Souza is away on holiday so I met with one of the registrars. He was very good and seemed to know a lot about my respiratory disease as well, so that helped build my confidence in him.
The written report for Monday's CT scan shows that none of the enlarged lymph nodes that appear on previous scans have changed significantly. Some have even shrunk slightly.
What this means is that it's "status Quo" for now. It's been eight months since I was advised of several enlarged lymph nodes in my pelvic region. At that time the doctors were very grim and suggested that I had relapsed and that there were very few treatment options available to me.
With no change in such a long period of time, it's fairly safe to say that the nodes are indolent and may not develop into anything significant at all. Or if they do it will be very slowly. This opens up other treatment options in the future should they be required.
So once again it's good news. It would have been better if there were no signs of any enlarged nodes, and everything had shrunk away, but the fact that nothing is growing in a hurry is pretty darn good ! I'll take that with open arms. I think after 8 months I might even use the word "Dormant".
Just how much of that is attributable to the masking effect of prednisone I don't know, but it seems odd that nodes could grow while under the highest dose of pred a year ago and then be held in check by lower doses now.
It's almost two years since I had the Stem Cell Transplant (otherwise known as a Bone Marrow Transplant). That's a significant milestone. Time to celebrate. I'll have one beer. :)
Cheers! ...Ron
