The “Make My Mummy Better” campaign has
been set up to fund treatment that I am receiving
in Germany for metastatic breast cancer
Registered Charity Address:
Friends Supporting Friends
Make My Mummy Better Campaign
Old Courthouse
High Street
Fairford
Gloucestershire
GL7 4AD
Registered Charity No. 1113977
Treatment Plan
A recent PET Scan shows that there is:
• Extensive malignant infiltration into both breasts;
• Cancerous cells in both the glandular tissue and the lateral thoracic side;
• Cancerous lymph nodes in my underarms and in my neck.
Dr Kopic has put together a treatment plan which he believes will result in my being in remission.
Chemosensitivity Testing
Tests are carried out on blood samples to see how the tumours react to different chemotherapies. It makes it possible to avoid using ineffective drugs so sparing patients the side effects normally associated with these agents and offering patients a better chance of response. Chemosensitivity testing is currently not available at home. Here it’s a matter of going through the different chemos available for a type of cancer and it's more of a general approach to all patients. The chemo-sensitivity testing looks at the individual.
Chemotherapy and Thermotherapy
Chemotherapy is the use of anti-cancer (cytotoxic) drugs to destroy cancer cells. Chemotherapy drugs can stop cancer cells dividing and reproducing themselves. As the drugs are carried in the blood, they can reach cancer cells anywhere in the body. Unfortunately, as the chemotherapy drugs can also affect some of the healthy cells in your body, they can cause unpleasant side effects.
Thermotherapy involves heating the body to an abnormally high body temperature. It is thought that heating areas of the body that contain a cancer, or heating the tumour itself, may help kill cancer cells. Giving thermotherapy in combination with chemotherapy helps improve the effectiveness of the chemotherapy. At the moment thermotherapy treatment is not available in the UK.
Dr Kopic would like to use chemotherapy and thermotherapy to try and reduce the tumours so that a double mastectomy can be performed. As it stands at the moment it would be very risky for me to have a double mastectomy because of how the cancer has spread. My UK Oncologist has told me that surgery could actually cause the cancer to spread and make the situation worse. Therefore, it is really important for chemotherapy and thermotherapy to shrink the tumours as much as possible before surgery is performed.
Double Mastectomy
The bulk of the cancer is in my breasts. Dr. Kopic feels that if we can get rid of both my breasts, then the rest of the treatment plan can focus on targeting what is left. I am hoping to have the double mastectomy in England. However, it will only be possible if the chemotherapy and thermotherapy can shrink the tumours enough for a surgeon to agree to perform the operation.
Chemotherapy and Thermotherapy
Chemo-sensitivity tests will be carried out again to see what chemotherapies the remaining tumours react to. Then more chemotherapy and thermotherapy will be used to reduce what is left.
Radiotherapy
Radiotherapy is the use of high energy x-rays and similar rays (such as electrons) to treat the disease. While radiotherapy can destroy cancer cells, it can also have an effect on some of the surrounding normal cells. The main side effect of radiotherapy is tiredness. I am hoping to receive the radiotherapy treatment here in the UK.
Dendritic Cell Vaccine (Immunotherapy)
Our natural defense against infectious disease and cancer is called the “immune system”. The immune system recognises germs and abnormal cells, such as cancer cells, because they do not come from the normal body - they are labeled “foreign”. It then kills them and stops the disease. Immune-based therapy is a novel cancer treatment strategy that uniquely recruits an individual’s immune system to fight cancer. This approach takes advantage of the body’s own ability to fight cancer in a highly specific way that avoids the debilitating side effects commonly associated with standard cancer treatments like chemotherapy and radiation. Successful immune-based therapies should also have a long-lasting treatment effect due to the ability of the immune response to persist and become re-activated at the first sign of tumor growth or relapse.
The dendritic cell vaccine will be produced by taking dendritic cells from my body and producing a vaccine specific to me. Dr Kopic hopes that we will be able to produce approximately 6 vaccines. These vaccines will be administered over a 6 month period.
After the intial dendritic cell vaccine therapy, I will hopefully only need to go back for 6 monthly maintenace vaccines.
