Nurse Liz Comes Through!

Only half of my treatment takes place at the clinic in Germany; the other half takes place at home here in Austin. Each time we leave the clinic, they pack up a month's supply of Newcastle Disease Virus into a dry ice container. Every other morning, Liz injects a small vial of the virus into me, in a 5-step procedure.

First, some background. The Newcastle Disease Virus selectively attacks cancer cells, and leaves normal cells alone. The problem is that the immune system starts clearing out the virus the moment it's injected -- so it's a race against time to have the virus in me for long enough to zap a good amount of cancer cells. To maximize the impact of the virus, Dr. Thaller has had two ports installed into my chest so that these injections can be aimed at particular parts of my body. One port aims toward my upper half, the other toward my lower; this way the virus injections aren't diluted by the entire bloodstream, and can therefore affect the bone metastases in different parts of my body.

So, the injection procedure: I prepare three different syringes -- one with saline solution, one with saline solution plus the virus, and one with taurolock and heparin (to keep the ports and the catheters clean). Liz then pokes a needle into my port, and attaches all of the syringes in a particular sequence until everything is inside me. It's all painless except for a tiny stick at the outset, and it takes about a half hour.

I am constantly amazed and grateful for Liz's steady hand in accomplishing this -- the whole procedure is *not* something that comes naturally to her, and she has really been a godsend with her perseverance and calmness.

Dr. Thaller says I need to keep injecting the virus for a year to have it be truly effective. Fortunately, there are absolutely no symptoms while the virus is active in my system -- only once did I feel a few cold-like symptoms (and that was on a day when I had run myself ragged and had only four hours of sleep).