Trial Clinic

It's been one of those weeks.  I upgraded my computer last weekend to 7 but didn't realise I had a 64 bit computer, it had previously been running on Vista but 32 instead of 64!  So it kept crashing, hubby went on the internet and purchased me a brand new one.  Sweet!

I use to be good with computers etc, but not any more I didn't set the new one up right,  we hit the button 'easy transfer', which didn't ask what we wanted and started transferring everything over, old programs the lot, so we crashed it and tried to restore to factory settings, didn't work properly so ended up calling in our IT guy to put it right.  So Tuesday night I got to be at 11.45 and couldn't warm up, Wednesday was all day again over the new computer and then it was Trial Clinic on Thursday.

We drove up to the Bobby Robson Cancer Centre which is situated at the Freeman in Newcastle.  We weren't sure what to expect or really why we were there but Dr Plummer was a lovely young lady who explained how trials work from Phase I, which is what she does.

She was pleased to see someone reasonably healthy in front of her and said I would probably be offered a trial and I would go on a list.  We asked questions, but stupidly neither of us were really prepared with questions. 

Phase I is where the drug has just completed it's rodent toxcity and ready for the first human to give it a whirl.  This is where they start 3 people on a low dose, if it doesn't have side effects and cancer growth isn't too much the next 3 get a larger dose, if the side effects aren't to difficult and the cancer growth is stable they increase again and again until the either hit terrible side effects or the cancer didn't stop.  It is a big risk on these, but at the same time just as much risk as having a placebo on a phase 3 trial.

The first trial is also a blanket trial, so it isn't just for meso, maybe 21 or 48 people could be enrolled with various cancers, it could work with one type and not with another.  Apparently that's how alimta was found,  one of the patients on a trial had meso and alimta only worked on his tumour.

When I was on alimta I felt guilty that some Rat had gone through such terrible pain and wasn't able to tell anyone or get any comfort, I guess you could say if I go ahead the Rat is getting its own back on me.  I don't like the thought of drugs being tried on animals, they can't say no or don't have a choice and I was really shocked to hear that Apes and Dogs are still used in the USA, I only hope I have never had something tried on either of them.

I was just thinking yesterday how I just took this whole meeting as if it were a normal everyday event, shows how after so long with meso you just become adjusted to living with it.  If this had taken place 6 years ago I would have been on the phone to my friends discussing it etc but we just came home and continued with life.

I had a great skype conversation the other evening with Lisa, how marvellous skype is, after all these years I am getting back into techno.  It was great to put a face to someone I am in communication with.  As I said a couple of years ago in My Letter to Meso, I have met some wonderful people because of this disease, and I hope that all of us keep expanding those circles and help each other through one of the worst cancers out there. 

We still have what is classed as a rare cancer, I don't know how with so many people dying from it every year, I guess its rare because it is so untreatable.  Asbestos is hard to kill and yesterday was another learning curve for me, our cells try to kill this fibre but it keeps irriating our cell structure until the cell structure collapses and becomes damaged, then it turns on itself and the rest of our cells, hence cancer is born.  Because the fibre is damage proof, thats why we used it for everything, the body just can't break the structure down.  Let us hope out there somewhere is a natural asbestos killer and one that will be found before too long.

Work today, back to the grind stone, so looking forward to having a day off