Chasing Trials South of the Border
Rethink is proud to republish the original blog posts of Leanne Coppen first featured by Chatelaine. Leanne passed away in 2011 from metastatic breast cancer and we are honoured that her friends and family have allowed us to share her words here on the Rethink blog.
MARCH 17, 2010 · 4:09 PM
Yesterday marked five weeks since I last received treatment for my cancer, thanks to low white blood cell counts preventing treatment in the weeks before my last CT scan. Five whole weeks since the last time I was given anything at all with which to combat this disease. They may say my cancer is unresponsive to treatment but something must have been making a difference, because in the past few weeks the cancer has noticeably advanced. I can literally feel itadvancing. There are lumps in places there never were before, and the old, familiar (once disappeared!) lump in my neck has grown to the size of a ping pong ball. Plus, my breathing has become a bit more laboured, and my coughing fits are sometimes so violent and unrelenting that I end up in tears.
To have the little flickering light of opportunity that the Montreal drug trial represented snuffed out at a time like this was utterly devastating. Universe, you are a turd-head. I ask it again: Why do Nazi war criminals and child molesters get to die of old age? Who’s in charge here? And don’t give me that “mysterious ways” crap. Come over here and watch me try to catch my breath long enough to read my kid a bedtime story and then talk to me about mysterious ways. It’s like the universe is being run by a schoolyard bully who is high on acid and has grown weary of torturing cats.
Alas, crying “Not fair! Not fair!” isn’t going to get me anywhere. My husband and I wiped our tired eyes and dusted ourselves off. Time to get back on our feet, yet again. Time to act.
So yesterday we went in to see my oncologist, fully prepared to coerce, plead, blackmail or otherwise drag her into a more active role in our desperate pursuit of a drug trial. Instead, we were pleasantly surprised to find that she was instructing us on the need to take immediate action and to move ahead with applications for all potential TDM1 clinical trials simultaneously. Her sense of urgency, it turns out, is equal to our own. Perhaps greater — I was almost alarmed at her no-time-to-lose approach.
In addition to the Great Trial Chase, we covered every physical concern I have, from the ping pong ball to the coughing fits. She made suggestions, proposed options, and was sympathetic but serious.
In short, I felt in every important way that I’m still her patient, and that she is committed to giving me the best care she can, even though this clinical trial quagmire is relatively uncharted territory for her too. She is “very busy” it’s true, but she is not the problem in this equation. If I point my finger (and I do) it’s not at her. I’m pointing it at the system’s treacherous gap, the one into which I have fallen and am struggling to clamber out of.
Anyway, while feeling good about my oncologist is important, what really matters is that we are once again moving toward doing something to push back against this cancer: We left with the enrollment process underway for three different TDM1 trials at six different sites in the U.S — several of which we have unfortunately already heard are closed. It’s a nail-biting time, trying to get into these trials. And while we have always said that what matters is that I get the right drugs, and not where I get them, the logistics and finances of pursuing treatment in the States are a bit daunting. But we’ll figure something out. First, I need to be accepted into a trial somewhere, then we’ll figure out how to get me there. We have to. What choice do we have?
I really believe TDM1 is promising, and right now all my energy is being directed at getting into one of these trials. I’ve literally been at it since I woke up this morning. I forgot to eat. I forgot to take my vitamins. I ran a bath and let it get cold. All that matters is getting into one of these trials. Okay, eating matters too.
But will it work? Something has to work. Last week, caught between the nightmarish fear of my own death and clinging to the faint glimmer of hope represented by the Montreal clinical trial, I tearfully asked my friend Eden, “But what if we go through all of this and the clinical trial doesn’t work?”
And she said, “I know. But what if it does?”
To read more from the Cancer is Crap series, click here.
