Appointments 2

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Ugh, a long day of appointments. Karen's bloodwork and follow-up with the medical oncologist took 2.5 hours. They were very busy with chemo patients, as some Monday's are. We barely had time for lunch before we had to take the cats in for their annuals.

The doctor has Karen starting on Tamoxifen for her hormone therapy, at least initially. She has blood tests scheduled in 3 months that determine whether she is pre- or post-menopausal. If she is now post, then he will change drugs to Arimidex. They work differently. One is effective for pre- the other for post- in preventing estrogen from either binding or being created. He listed off a bunch of scary, but unlikely side effects. He also asked if she wanted to start on anything to control her hot flashes, but she decided to wait unless they got worse.

As the doctor was checking her scars, she pointed out a nodule that had come up from a ridge on the scar from her axillary lymph nodes. He ordered an ultra-sound on Friday just to make certain it is only scar tissue.

For the next year, Karen will see the medical oncologist once every 3 months. For the second year, it will be every 4 months. After that, every 6.

The good news is that the port can come out as soon as she can schedule it with the surgeon. That might be able to be done in the office, which is creepy but makes it easier. She'll call the surgeon tomorrow to set that up.

I think that it for the moment.

Karen has her follow-up with the radio-oncologist Thursday morning, which I will also likely go to, as I will to the ultrasound on Friday. Busy week.

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