Sunday, September 27, 2009
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Monday, September 7, 2009
extra, extra...
so i just got off the phone with michelle, an editor with the san jose mercury news.
she called to clear up some last minutes details, and said the article featuring how FamiliesCAN helps families such as ours, will be on the newsstands tomorrow morning.
in a post two weeks ago, i wrote about how trish and i were interviewed by joe rodriguez of the san jose merc.
joe, and photo journalist nhat v. meyer, joined us at the stanford university medical center while trish was undergoing a bone scan.
i look forward to reading the article over a nice cup of coffee in the morning....
i will post a link to the article when it is published to the mercury website, but i urge everyone to go out and support the local newspaper and buy a copy or two.
thanks for checking in, hope you had a nice long weekend..
she called to clear up some last minutes details, and said the article featuring how FamiliesCAN helps families such as ours, will be on the newsstands tomorrow morning.
in a post two weeks ago, i wrote about how trish and i were interviewed by joe rodriguez of the san jose merc.
joe, and photo journalist nhat v. meyer, joined us at the stanford university medical center while trish was undergoing a bone scan.
i look forward to reading the article over a nice cup of coffee in the morning....
i will post a link to the article when it is published to the mercury website, but i urge everyone to go out and support the local newspaper and buy a copy or two.
thanks for checking in, hope you had a nice long weekend..
Thursday, September 3, 2009
bone density study at UCSF...
trish returned to UCSF for the first time since we received our second opinion from dr. alvarado in April of 2008.
fortunately, this time trish didn't not go up there for a diagnosis. trish was asked to be a part of a bone density research study being performed at UCSF. so this morning she headed up to the city for the test. unfortunately, they could not give her the test because she took the bone scan test last week at stanford, and the radioactive dye she was injected with can screw with the results of the bone density test at UCSF...
sooo... they took trish's blood and did a few other tests, but will reschedule the actual bone density test in a few weeks, after the dye has worked itself out of trish's body completely.
its a really nice change to be able to contribute to research, and not be a part of the treatment...
fortunately, this time trish didn't not go up there for a diagnosis. trish was asked to be a part of a bone density research study being performed at UCSF. so this morning she headed up to the city for the test. unfortunately, they could not give her the test because she took the bone scan test last week at stanford, and the radioactive dye she was injected with can screw with the results of the bone density test at UCSF...
sooo... they took trish's blood and did a few other tests, but will reschedule the actual bone density test in a few weeks, after the dye has worked itself out of trish's body completely.
its a really nice change to be able to contribute to research, and not be a part of the treatment...
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
consultation with dr. lee, plastic surgeon...
this morning we met with dr. gordon lee, the surgeon who will be performing trish's reconstruction.
we met with dr. lee in october of last year and learned of our choices, so today was more a refresher for us, but more importantly for dr. lee to examine trish and check out the canvas he has to work with.
during the upcoming surgery, dr. lee will follow dr. jeffrey's mastectomy and insert tissue expanders on both sides of trish. the tissue expanders are the first step of the reconstruction process, and will be later swapped out for implants months down the road.
expanders are basically implants that have the ability to be filled on the weekly basis. they are inserted behind the muscle and filled up with saline to a volume that the skin can handle. every week or two, trish will return to the dr. lee's office so the expanders can be filled more, thus expanding the skin even more.
the whole point is to stretch/expand the skin to the point of final implant size. depending on the final size desired, this is a process that can take weeks or months.
once the expanders are filled to the desired size, they are left alone for the body to adjust to the final size and a final surgery is scheduled to remove the expander and replace them with implants. we anticipate the second surgery to be somewhere in the May 2010 time frame.
as for this upcoming surgery, we are hoping for it to be during the week of Oct 5th. trish doesn't want to be in recovering mode for caden's 3rd birthday that is coming up at the end of september. but ultimately we are at the mercy of dr. jeffrey and dr. lee coordinating their schedules, and since trish is no longer "cancerous", she slides down the totem pole a bit..
thanks for checking in...
we met with dr. lee in october of last year and learned of our choices, so today was more a refresher for us, but more importantly for dr. lee to examine trish and check out the canvas he has to work with.
during the upcoming surgery, dr. lee will follow dr. jeffrey's mastectomy and insert tissue expanders on both sides of trish. the tissue expanders are the first step of the reconstruction process, and will be later swapped out for implants months down the road.
expanders are basically implants that have the ability to be filled on the weekly basis. they are inserted behind the muscle and filled up with saline to a volume that the skin can handle. every week or two, trish will return to the dr. lee's office so the expanders can be filled more, thus expanding the skin even more.
the whole point is to stretch/expand the skin to the point of final implant size. depending on the final size desired, this is a process that can take weeks or months.
once the expanders are filled to the desired size, they are left alone for the body to adjust to the final size and a final surgery is scheduled to remove the expander and replace them with implants. we anticipate the second surgery to be somewhere in the May 2010 time frame.
as for this upcoming surgery, we are hoping for it to be during the week of Oct 5th. trish doesn't want to be in recovering mode for caden's 3rd birthday that is coming up at the end of september. but ultimately we are at the mercy of dr. jeffrey and dr. lee coordinating their schedules, and since trish is no longer "cancerous", she slides down the totem pole a bit..
thanks for checking in...
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