Ultimately Super News

On August 17th,  I was removed from the drug study for Vemarafenib.  I no longer qualified to participate because I chose to receive other treatment (whole brain radiation and gamma knife radio-surgery) in addition to taking the medication.  The purpose of the study was to demonstrate that the drug alone was saving the lives of brain cancer patients with a BRAF gene mutation.  (This is the genetic mutation that allows the brain cancer cells to reproduce so rapidly.)  Vemarafenib is a chemo pill that inhibits this function, thus shutting down the ability for the cancer to grow like crazy.

In my case, the drug appears to be able to slow down the process but not entirely prevent the cancer from spreading.  The advantage of being in the study was that I received this extremely expensive drug for free from the manufacturer.  Now I would have to to obtain the drug commercially.  That is once my insurance company was convinced to pay for it.  The process also involved finding a specialty pharmacy that could distribute it and at the same time was authorized by my insurer.  Suffice it to say - major uphill battle.

I was going to run out of the drug supplied by the study this past Saturday.  As of Thursday - despite a MAJOR effort, things did not look encouraging  for the new supply to arrive before then.  But how could Team Studzinski fail with all the extended support it possesses?

I am happy to report my drug arrived on Friday - talk about a Super Day!    Note the proof of our collective super strength below.  Surely this picture provided by the Vieira family of Rhode Island serves as proof of the power of our massive support network.

We remain beyond grateful for every one's contributions: prayers, cards, AND pictures.