Getting started

This is our first attempt at blogging. We will use our blog to update everyone mainly on Ed's health as we proceed through his treatment for renal cell carcinoma. If you want details from Mar. 7 (when he first began having serious pain in his right hip) to today, Saturday, April 14, it would be much easier to talk about that over the phone--yes, there's that much detail. We'll try to provide an update every day that he has something going on. So you can expect an update next on Tuesday, April 17, after he has his first whole brain radiation treatment and hip radiation. He did the mapping session to set up this procedure on Friday. The treatments will be every day, 15 minutes per day, for 10 working days. After that, he starts on a new drug called Nexavar. The radiation is intended to prevent uncontrolled growth of the cancer in the brain and to ease the hip pain, and the drug is used to extend the period of no-growth of the cancer. He has been on steriods for 1 1/2 weeks to build him up for these treatments and reduce the swelling around the brain lesions. Right now he has some hip pain upon getting up from a chair and taking the first step. More annoying is a persistent hiccuping or burping, one right after another, especially at night (which of course means we are not getting much nighttime sleep--love those daytime naps!). This is apparently from the steriods. So if you call and talk to him, you can expect delays in his words while he burps a lot.