After seven years of remission, the cancer had returned to my lungs. I decided to rechallenge with immunotherapy. After all, it had worked so well before. Even with the risk of an autoimmune reaction it was a gamble I thought worth taking. The big question was if and when the side effects would come roaring back.
My third immunotherapy infusion brought on fairly serious joint pain, especially in my left knee, leaving me hobbling and my wrists very sore. This can happen — because the brakes are essentially taken off the immune system autoimmune side effects such as arthritis, colitis and diabetes are not uncommon. In my case the discomfort was bad enough that I decided to stop immunotherapy and focus on getting pain relief, so I started taking prednisone, 60 mg per day, after we returned from a long weekend in Chicago to celebrate my mother’s 90th birthday. (It’s been an eventful month!).
CT Scans of my chest, pelvis and abdomen followed a few days later and nurse Virginia called me with the news from the radiologist report on my drive home to Keene from Boston. I was navigating traffic but the gist was that three tumors in my lungs are shrinking away. The actual wording in the report: “Since April 19 2022 two previously large solid nodules have nearly disappeared and a third is substantially smaller. There are no new or growing measurable lung nodules.”
“It’s great news,” Virginia said. “You’re clearly very sensitive to immunotherapy. It’s somewhat unusual to see this strong a response after only three infusions.”
It was such a relief to hear her words, and Katharina and I savored that news. We will be monitoring the response and are hopeful that, like last time’s which lasted seven years, it will be a durable one.
