Cautious Hope

Today Ella had what is called an MIBG Scan. The way it works is they inject her with a radioactive form of iodine ("less radiation in her body than you would get on a cross-country flight" we are told, though) as a tracer, and then they give her a CAT scan to see where things are glowing, basically. The tracer is drawn to any areas where there is rapid cell growth (like cancer cells), and helps to show where else it might be in her body. It also gives some false positives as certain spots in the body naturally have rapid cell growth (the brain and heart, for example).

Anyway, she had that test today, and we got the results. First, a caveat: in 10-15% of cases, the cancer for whatever reason just doesn't bond with the tracer, and since the tumor is no longer in Ella's body for them to know for sure "we know there's cancer there and it is/isn't glowing, so we know whether or not it bonds", they can't be completely sure, but the scan was completely clear. There's nothing in Ella's body.

This won't change anything about the treatment regimen, as they want to be absolutely sure they kill any cancer cells that might be hiding somewhere, so we will still be doing the chemo, transplant and radiation, but it starts us from a much stronger place. A lot of kids that go through this have the cancer spread all throughout their bodies.

Some other stuff I forgot to mention about the treatment options earlier - Ella qualifies for a clinical trial - a test of alternative methods of treating the cancer, in hopes of finding better treatments for future patients. In some hospitals, the first phase of the clinical trial adds in another chemo medication. However, since Seattle Children's was part of a pilot program for this clinical trial, and they came to the conclusion that it worked better than the existing methods, the first phase actually is identical to their standard "BAT" (Best Available Treatment), so there is no change there. In the second phase, however, there is the option to have two bone marrow transplants (and the two intensive chemo treatments that go with it). We're still not sure whether or not we want to participate in the second phase and put Ella through all that, however we are participating in the first phase, since it is exactly the same treatment Ella would ordinarily be getting, and the data will help their research for kids in the future. The lead doctor on this particular study is actually Ella's oncologist, Dr. Julie Park, so that's pretty awesome. As a few people have said to us, fighting Neuroblastoma is her life's work. I think Ella's in good hands. We've also decided to let them take part of her tumor for research as well (a "biology study").