Sorry for the delay in postings; I was a little under the weather yesterday, but am feeling much better today. Just a touch of a cold, but Erika was nice enough to play nurse and brought me heaps of Vitamin C and throat lozenges, and now I'm almost as good as new! They did another ultrasound today, and found that the fluid on dad's lungs is satisfactory enough to schedule him for the whole-body hyperthermia for Friday morning. He'll go in around 10 or 11 AM, and should be finished about 4 hours later. Most people are quite sleepy for the rest of the day, but that's good; it means your body is healing.
It's actually quite an interesting process. They induce fever on the body, and gradually bring his inner core temperature up to 103-104 degrees Fahrenheit. This takes about 1-1/2 hours, and then they begin administering the chemo while the body is at this temperature. The heat makes the cancer cells' outer lining rupture, and they are much more responsive to the chemo, in addition to enhancing the benefits (not necessarily the side effects) of the of the chemo as well. During this time, they also raise the blood sugar level, which also causes the cancer cells to deteriorate because they begin to eat up the sugar, which is laced with chemo, and you get the idea. They hold the body at the higher temperature for 1 hour, and then slowly begin to cool it down. After this, they are monitored every 20 minutes until they're up and around that evening, and detox infusions are begun rather immediately after the hyperthermia is finished to begin flushing the body of the chemo. I have to say, it's rather genius that you allow the cancer cells to be exposed to the chemo for as short a time as possible, while minimizing the potential impact on the body afterwards. What a concept!
So, I'll post an update tomorrow evening letting you know how everything went. I'm sure it will go very smoothly!
Ciao for now,
Chels
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