On January 16 and 27, 2014, we met with Dr. Charles Ryan and his fellow, Dr. Adam Siegel.
Adam gathered a lot of information, entered it into the computer and then brought in Dr. Ryan.
At first, Dr. Ryan thought I would benefit from neoadjuvant chemotherapy and even recommend a plan. Upon further review, he decided to send my case to a tumor board to get its recommendation.
The tumor board met on January 17 and it was unanimous that I needed my bladder taken out. There were eight members on the tumor board and four of them were oncologists like Dr. Ryan. He was out of town, so the case was presented by Dr. Siegel. All four of the oncologists recommended neoadjuvant chemotherapy.
The second meeting with Dr. Ryan was challenging and took place on January 27, 2014. The chemotherapy plan suggested by the tumor board consisted of four cycles of chemotherapy, each four weeks.
Dr. Ryan corrected the plan to four cycles of chemotherapy, each three weeks. Cispltain and gemcitabine are to be administered on the first day of each cycle, along with anti-nausea medications, gemcitabine with anti-nausea drugs on the eighth day, and then a week off. Yay! I had cisplatin 17 years ago along with 5FU.
When they told me I was scheduled to start on January 30, I balked. I could not imagine fighting rush hour traffic to get to UCSF by 9:00 in the morning, have to park, and be there all day.
I suggested that I talk to Dr. Gullion about administering the treatment close to home, and they accepted my suggestion. I had already scheduled an appointment with him for January 31.
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