Late Breaking News on Chase's MRI

Chase’s tumor appears to be shrinking! We just got the MRI results of what was intended to be a new “baseline” test and we were warned not to expect too much, since he isn’t even up to his full dose of ANP yet and the tumor would most likely have grown during the period from diagnosis to beginning treatments, particularly since the pathology indicates a Grade 3 glioma (anaplastic astrocytoma – high grade / aggressive type of cancer). The radiologists reviewing the MRI results indicated that a typical grade 3 glioma would “mushroom” (could double in size every 2 weeks). Thus, just not having it grow much would’ve been a victory…

Yet, the MRI indicated that the tumor definitely didn’t grow and it appears to have shrunk by 5-10%!! This is just awesome news! All we were looking for was a slight indication that the treatment plan we’re using is working to firm up our resolve to stick with it vigilantly and to demonstrate to “traditional medicine” that there was no reason to take the kind of action they were recommending (radiation and / or chemo). Well, we certainly have that kind of resolve now. Ironically, Doctor Jurida at the Burzynski Clinic recently shared with me a case where one of his patients had a 5-10% reduction, which the monitoring doctor continually referred to as ‘stable”; however, this happened repeatedly over 9 months, so he told his patient that if his case is ‘stable”, how come the difference between the first MRI and the last MRI over the 9 months shows a 50% reduction (get the point)?

Unfortunately, we didn’t get to conduct the PET scan to get more data on the level of radiological activity of the tumor. During the anesthesia, Chase wasn’t breathing well so they had to intubate him. Then, after the MRI, we were told that the material they would need to inject for the PET needs to be in his system for two hours before starting the test; thus, he would’ve had to wait in recovery for 2 hours while being intubated and then head to the other test area. This just seemed like too much to subject him to under the circumstances. In hindsight, they should’ve injected the material for the PET before conducting the MRI (but that would’ve required too much foresight, since these kind of “back-to-back” tests never happen). Anyhow, we’ll have to wait until next Thursday to conduct the PET scan, so we’ll just have to settle for the good news from the MRI for now.

This is definitely reason for us to celebrate! We’re planning to take Chase to one of his favorite spots (Chuckee Cheese or Jeepers)… We’re pleased to share the great news with everyone and we thank you all for the overwhelming support. Keep the Prayer Trains Rolling… they’re definitely working!

Love,
John & Carol Sammut
Chase & Barbara Ann