Treatment - Day 16: No Ulcer

Cathy and I just got back from a long day at the hospital. Radiation was at 9:45 and Chemo was scheduled for 10:30. The chemo room was really busy today. They were missing a few staff, supplies were short and there were lots of patients. Fortunately, my nurse had lots of patience. :)

I finished chemo at about 3pm and then went over to radiology so they could take another look at my feeding tube and try to resolve why my stomach still hurts.

First, they shot some contrast (Iodine) into my stomach through the feeding tube so they could use a device like a Sonogram to see what was going on. They didn't use any of the goop on my skin like they do with a fetal Sonogram. So I may not have the correct name of the machine. That was inconclusive so they called up the CT folks to see if the CT machine was open.

So the second thing Radiology did was to walk me over to the CT machine and take a quick couple of runs through it. That took all of 2 minutes.

While the Radiologist can see my liver and the tube close together on the CT scan their machine can't do a scan while I stand up. The Radiologist's theory is that the edge of my liver is sitting on the feeding tube. When I stand or sit upright my liver is putting pressure on the stomach end of the tube and my stomach isn't sure what to make of it so it sends out stomach-like pain signals.

One option to resolve it is to remove the tube and place it in a different position. The tube would be unavailable for at least 24 hours and there is no gaurantee that I wouldn't run into issues with the new location. Given that getting 99% of my nutrition now relies on the tube this isn't a workable option.

I simply need to spend most of my time laying down. Given the amount of fatigue I get from the chemo laying down isn't a problem. Traveling in the car has been a bit of an issue though. But I'm working on the ghetto look by leaning the seat as far back as possible. I just need to wear my baseball hat off center and get some bling and I'll have the look down.

On a positive note I didn't come home with any new prescriptions!