Good News but more questions
Hi All I will apologise in advance if this turns out to be rambling. I had my 2nd round of AC chemo last Monday and saw the med onc who thought my lump (was 4cm) seemed to be responding (having 4 x 3 weekly Ac then 12 x weekly Taxol Herceptin prior to surgery then radio). The whole plan was to see how my lump (ER+ HER2+ fast growing) responded to all of these drugs so we could chart a course if I got a recurrence (which I definitely picked up "vibes"about as being likely but both surgeon and onc say nothing unless asked a direct question.) Sounded like a great plan after I got my head around the "no you can't have it out now". Thing is this week the lump appears to have disappeared. ie not palpable to surgeon and she sends me off to have a clip put in under ultrasound. Except very highly experienced and lovely radiologist can't find it either. After a serious amount of poking around and guided by my instinct as to where it was in goes the clip. He was happy with the siting of the clip on the mammogram so there must be still something to see there. So, everybody says great news. But I am now wondering. How will they know if it responds to Herceptin/Taxol if there is nothing to see? How will the surgeon know how much tissue to take out? Will it grow back when the AC stops? If the tissue that the clip is attached to is cancerous and gets killed off will the clip move? Has anybody had any experience with any of this?