Terminating cancer

Right now I'm sitting in the depths of wolverine territory at the U of M Hospital. Typing this post via the iPhone that my friend have me to use as an iPod touch, due to the fact it no longer works as a phone (he got a new one). This is day two of being at this hospital, so I think that I ought to begin by filling you in about monday.

Monday at the hospital

Brittany getting shot by a laser cannon.
Actually, she is getting her radiation level measured.

Pretty easy day today, did some blood work on Brittany to check out some stuff. Mainly to see if she is preggers, which she isn't, thank goodness, and to check her TSH level. That stands for thyroid stimulating hormone. Basically what this is, is the stuff that regulates the thyroid. The thing is, Brittany doesn't have a thyroid, so her TSH is really high, which is what causes the side effects of being tired, some short term memory loss, irritability, some soreness, ect. A normal persons TSH count is right about 0.3-3, Brittany's is at 67! This is good for treatment though, because thyroid cells are the only cells in the body that uptake iodine. The higher the TSH, the hungrier her thyroid cells are for iodine. The treatment for thyroid cancer is to attach a radioactive isotope to iodine, so that the thyroid cells eat up the iodine and are killed by the radiation. If you are anything like me, you probably were thinking, "but she doesn't have a throid.". Well, when cancer spreads, it always stays the same cells as where it started. So if cancer starts on the thyroid and spreads anywhere, it will always be thyroid cells where ever the cancer is. And we are trying to get rid of every last thyroid cell!

Brittany also had a chest x-ray and a test to measure the raiation levels already present in her body(radiation is everywhere, it's just normally so minut, that it isn't harmful) to establish her baseline for future tests. That is what is going on in this picture. After this, she was given a small dose of radiation (sorry no pic), so that her thyroid cells will light up on all the scans they do on Tuesday. She just drinks it through a needle, and they keep it in this big lead case.

Tuesday

Back at the hospital today. Got here at 9:30 and got right to the scans. I will post a pic below.  She had a full body scan, a chest scan, and a throat scan.  As well as a CT scan. We met with the thryroid cancer specailist doctor and she was really happy with the scans and decided that instead of tomorrow, we could do the radiation today!  What a huge blessing and will save us a trip back to Ann Arbor.  Perhaps more important than saving a car ride is that their isn't much cancer left in Brittany's body after the surgery. The only cancer left is in the neck, Praise God.  So they gave her the radiation, (I wasn't allowed to watch), and now we let that kill all the cancer cells :)

We now have Brittany in isolation in her room.  She isn't allowed to have any direct contact with any living creature for the next 3-5 days.  There are a buch of crazy rules too.  They aren't hospital rules, they are given by the federal government.  Here are some:

We have to keep all her eating utensils seperate, recommended using disposable utensils.

We have to keep her laundry seperate.

She has to flush like three times after she goes to the bathroom.

No one can use the toilet that she uses.

We have to keep her trash seperate.

Just a sign outside a room at the hospital

Brittany getting a full body scan.  Look carefully, she is in there

Brittany getting ready to get her radiation treatment with our awesome radiation technition!

We have another appointment on Friday, more of a check up type thing.  And she will get another full body scan. Shouldn't be a big deal, we will keep you posted :)