Doctor Visits Today

This morning I had three appointments at The Vanderbilt Clinic. First, my weekly blood tests. Good news again on my white blood cell count was 10.8 – which is very normal and dramatically higher than the 0.8 reading I had one week after my first round of chemotherapy.

Next, I met with Amy and Glenda about the mouth rinse clinical trial that I’m participating in. So far only a small sore on the tip of my tongue that I first noticed this morning. Amy swabbed my mouth -like getting a DNA sample on a detective show. Then mixing the mouth rinse ingredients – 3 of them – and rinsing for 30 seconds. Now I wait for 90 minutes before additional blood is drawn.

While waiting, Dr. Rachel arrives for my weekly oncology followup consultation. Blood work is looking good. I have a sore spot on my butt so she give me a prescription for that. Then we ask about timing for the radiation phase of my treatment. Beverly has the details. The third round of chemotherapy starts May 25. Radiation typically starts three weeks later just as if I was going to have another round of chemotherapy. We will need to get the exact start date from the radiation oncologist. To add a bit of complexity to the situation, the radiation suite at Vanderbilt was heavily damaged during our recent floods here in Nashville. The satellite clinic in Franklin is currently seeing patients from 6am to midnight. Hopefully the Vanderbilt clinic will be repaired soon. I will receive chemotherapy once per week and radiation five times per week for seven weeks.

We (Mary and I) finished all of the above by about 10:45, just in time for me to get on a conference call at 11am as Mary drove us home!

An unexpected doctor’s visit was required when my temporary crown chipped while eating lunch. Thankfully, Dr. Sonia’s team was able to squeeze me in this afternoon and repaired the problem crown.

I did also get some work done, but all in all a busy day. Thankfully the fatigue was much less today!