Some sad news...

My dear, sweet dad was admitted to MVH last week with severe pain in his sternum, so severe that he could not catch his breath. They did a chest x-ray whiched showed the sternum to be suspicious looking. A CAT scan was ordered and revealed a 2-inch tumor on his sternum. He was admitted for pain control and further testing was ordered. The doc's did a bone scan on Monday afternoon that showed the tumor to be primarily localized in his sternum. No other "hot spots" were identified, which was actually the best news we could ask for. A biopsy was performed on Tuesday and the diagnosis at this point is "monoclonal gammopathy." Unfortunately, we don't know a lot about this, but we do know that it is a precursor to more serious cancers such as multiple myeloma and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. There are M-proteins in his bone marrow that are over producing/copying themselves at a crazy rate and boxing out the white blood cells, red blood cells, etc. He will be seeing specialists in the next coming weeks, and also hopefully he will have an excisional biopsy of the tumor and what's left of his sternum as the area continues to spasm and cause him a great deal of pain.

We are extremely hopeful and optimistic that this diagnosis was caught in time for treatment and therapy to be curable. This mass in his chest and the pain he was having in his sternum was misdiagnosed 9 months ago as "costrochondritis" (by another doctor - not our family GP), and we are very thankful that it was actually a "burp" (which put a lot of pressure on his already deteriorated sternum) that caused the spasms, difficulty breathing, and ultimately led my mom to taking him to the hospital last Sunday night. Otherwise, I am afraid to think of how long this might have gone on undiagnosed?? Very scary to imagine...

My dad has been so strong and upbeat about this whole thing. I love him with all of my heart and soul! Please keep him in your thoughts and prayers! Love to all, Brenda