Saturday, May 13, 2017

Solitary Plasmacytoma.... A CT Scan of Dom's LEFT hip

This was taken on Wednesday.  The image is flipped.  The area circled on the right is actually his LEFT hip.  This is where they suspect a Plasmacytoma....and where he is getting radiation.  Notice the difference between his "good" hip and the affected hip.

We finished up "day 2 of radiation" yesterday.  8 more to go. The radiologist warned him that although he feels nothing now, the pain will be coming from surrounding nerves around the hip that will be affected by this radiation.

We have the weekend off, and then back at it Monday morning.

Solitary Plasmacytoma

Solitary plasmacytoma is a rare disorder that is similar to multiple myeloma, although patients do not have myeloma cells in the bone marrow or throughout the body. Instead, patients have a tumor composed of plasma cells that are restricted to a single area of the body — usually the bone, but sometimes an organ.

At Memorial Sloan Kettering, our experts diagnose solitary plasmacytoma when a biopsy of the tumor detects the presence of plasma cells, but additional tests do not reveal signs of multiple myeloma — such as amyloid protein in the blood and urine, or the presence of myeloma cells in the bone marrow.
*THIS IS DOM....  bone marrow and blood work have been fine*
Our doctors can sometimes cure solitary plasmacytoma of the bone with radiation therapy or surgery to destroy or remove the tumor. However, 70 percent of patients with solitary plasmacytoma eventually develop multiple myeloma and need additional treatment such as chemotherapy, possibly combined with stem cell transplantation.
*This is DOM also*

When this type of tumor develops outside the bone — in the lungs, throat, or other organs — it is called an extramedullary plasmacytoma. For more than half of patients with extramedullary plasmacytoma, the condition is cured with radiation therapy. Less frequently, patients with extramedullary plasmacytoma develop multiple myeloma. Our doctors also can treat this progression of the disease with chemotherapy and, for some patients, stem cell transplantation.

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