Hi kary, Thank you for your very thoughtful reply. I do understand what your concerns are, I have in some ways, gone through them myself. Let's keep our fingers crossed that perhaps vaccines or immune therapy will help some of the younger ones sooner than later. My concern, and this is of course genuine, and you have to know that I much rather prefer to state what I am thinking up front - is that when we see young children on this as of yet undetermined long term therapy and know that for all its good there are some very serious side effects that will no doubt plague children well beyond their childhood (but at least they'll be alive), it just makes me wonder. Even I have re thought about the BMT route, so far Gleevec nor Sprycel are cures, we know that. I have been looking around into other cancers and I am impressed with the success that is happening for these patients being treated in hospitals as opposed to being treated as out patients on long term drug therapies. As I mentioned, I have several friends who are completly cancer free - drug free and really having an opportunity to turn the page on this part of their lives, without forgetting the valuable lessons and great opprotunities for grace and thankfulness that the journey with cancer has given them. Unlike us who are trapped in this non stop saga (much like the worlds yuckiest soap opera) of continuous follow up, molecular blood tests, doctor visits, new aches and pains, health insurance forms. As much as we try to forget, CML is still the BIG ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM. Taking daily pills, going to the doctor, even making the appointments and monitoring the side effects are unfortunately all opporunities for the constant reminder (try as we might to go have that "normal" life we keep hearing about) of the diagnosis of cancer.
You are right though, some families don't have a choice and i surely hope yours does continue to have choices. Just a little thought though, did you know that close to 85% of ALL (most typical form of childhood Leukemia) are now being cured. We also know that close to 80% of all APL are cured with a vitamin derivative and nearly all cases of hairy cell leukemia are cured with Interferon treatment. Of course all of this happened before a drug comapny figured out how to make the CML "market" worth 2.1 billion dollars - this is the part that worries me the most! Love, Peace and all good things - and hopefully Tony and all of us will continue to do well. Cheryl-Anne --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ [CMLHope] A support group of http://cmlhope.com ------------------------------------------------- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "CMLHope" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/CMLHope -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
