From: compulsive@mindspring.com <compulsive@mindspring.com>
To: cancer@via-media.com <cancer@via-media.com>
Subject: leiomyosarcoma of the liver
Date: Thursday, August 20, 1998 4:38 PM


Dear Kent,

I've been searching for months for info on LMS and then I found your web
page! Read a lot of the letters from others but never found many that were
similar. And none like mine... Two years ago I had surgery to remove a tumor
on small bowel which the doctor called leiomyosarcoma with uncertain
malignant potential . The follow up was to be CT scans and lung
x-rays annually for 8 years. The second year (this past March) the CT showed
5-6 tumors in my liver. Biopsy performed after MRI confirmed tumors. I was
referred to Dr. Daneker, an oncology surgeon at Emory in Atlanta, who
planned to remove tumors in July. After having arteriogram and further CTs,
he informed me that the left lobe would probably all have to be removed and
2 tumors on the right side could not be removed. After asking how long I
had, he said 6 months without surgery and probably l8 months with surgery.
I told him to find alternative treatment so he called M. D. Anderson and was
told by them that chemoembolization was being tried successfully and that
the radiologist at EMORY were performing this procedure! He called me very
excited about the treatment, canceled surgery and set me up for this to be
done on July 27. They inserted catheter into groin and directly into liver
where 3 sites were given doses of doxorubicin, cisplatin and mitomycin and then plugged. I was dismissed after 4 days and have had all the classic symptoms of chemo. The plan is to wait 3 months and have a CT scan to see what the chemo did to the tumors. One had blood vessels too small to have the chemo injected into it so we hope it got some "by proxy" or may have to wait until it grows larger and inject again -- provided this works. What I have been told by this surgeon is that surgery was not a cure and chemo is not a cure. But it is a slow growing type cancer and you can keep having either surgery or chemo (if it works) as long as your body can tolerate it. What a way to live!?!?! Not my style, I don't think. Being sick makes me SICK! I'll bring you up to date after my CT in a couple of months and let you know if these guys know what they're doing!

Keep the faith, Cynthia from LaGrange, GA

ne