Provenge II: Gathering Dumb T-Cells

Sorry this is going to be all treatment all the time so if you don’t want to know about the Provenge treatment I had a year ago last month you might want to think about moving on to your desktop hangman [ooo gallows humor twice]  game or some such but I’ve had some requests about Provenge.

Please keep in your mind that the guy writing this post is no doctor.  Someone vomits and I’m running the opposite direction hoping someone else takes care of the vomiter lest I turn into the vomitee.  Hell, one time I ran my pick up, albeit slowly, into a telephone pole because my dog threw up in the front seat and I instantly became vomitee. Hey she was a big dog.  So no doctor could I be.

With the Provenge treatment you will have to do two steps twice for a total of four steps.  Get the dumb cells through a process called Pheresis and ship them to boot camp.  Then two days later get the Ninja cells back in your body via infusion.  Then a couple weeks later do it again. 

 

As I understand it, Provenge is a teacher of sorts.  The nurses grab a few dumb cells from you that the Evil Empire has confused, sends them to school to become prostate cancer Ninjas, then put those kick ass smart cells back in to you.  Those Ninja T-cells go to work on the Evil Empire.  Not to defeat the Evil Empire but, like my Ninjas have done, to slow the Evil Empires progress down.  Sounds scary? Well it is for the cancer cells but it’s neither scary nor painful if you follow a few tricks.

Here’s the first trick:  

While you are reclining, depending on your weight for a couple hours at least, in the very comfortably padded Pheresis chair watching your DVD of choice, reading or having a nice conversation with the very attentive nurse a number of things will happen.   

You’ll have to pee.

 

Peeing for someone with advanced prostate cancer is a humility most of the healthy don’t have to experience.  But, and remember this for the reading scratching your anything hint, you can not get out of the chair before they have retrieved your dumb cells.  It’s not like an IV where the IV drags you along like some leashed puppy dog.  You are attached to an immovable machine so peeing involves a bottle and the nurse doing the best to preserve your dignity.

Pee before you get in the chair even if you have to turn the faucet on and stand in front of the porcelain for fifteen minutes with everyone waiting.  Trust me on this.

Second trick:

Many men refuse to have a Hickman Tri- Fusion Catheter installed.  DO IT. Put One In.  It is not hard to keep clean no matter what you’ve heard.  Maybe more on that in some other post. 

The consequences of not having the catheter installed are myriad a few being; the IV needles are huge and not flexible.  You can’t bend your arms [yes you will have a needle in the “in” arm and a needle in the “out” arm] so you can’t move for hours forget about reading a book.  Because you can’t move your arms you can forget about scratching anything.  Remember how frustrating the last trip to the MRI was with how badly your nose itched?   

Your veins will probably, not sure what word to use, collapse and in the future those veins won’t cooperate with the nurse whom is desperately trying not to jab you.

Third:

Even if you’ve had a recent hot flash take the offered blanket you will get cold.

I weighed 225 and I was in the Pheresis chairs for a little more then three hours for both my visits.  The mechanics of skimming dumb cells and sending them to school sounds complicated.  Rest assured for me there was no pain, no panic.  In fact I would take my lap top with me, work for an hour and take a blessed nap for two hours.  Any of you seriously reading this for information know how great it is to be able to take a nap.

I know that Provenge was a benefit I hadn’t expected and will tell you tomorrow how they get the Ninja T cells back into you so they can fight the Effing Evil Empire. 

Remember how exciting it is when "that number" goes down.  Provenge makes sense and worked for me.

For those of you worried about the catheter I’ll tell you how that’s a nothing and throw in a funny story about the Surgery Police [this gal was pretty over zealous].   

But that will be after the Ninja Provenge post.

Now, quit worrying and go do your taxes.

Talk to you later