Good Health - Medical Directory Fall 2022 | Page 12

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2022 GOOD HEALTH
She was told however , that the doctors believed she had the spot on her rectum at that time . “ Oftentimes if you have cancer and you don ’ t know about it ,” Megan explained , “ and they do a surgery like that ,… it can cause the cancer to metastasize , to grow and spread . They were pretty sure that ’ s what had happened .” Dr . Abigail Byrnes , Megan ’ s primary oncologist , confirmed not only that she had cancer but that it was rectal cancer . Megan began chemotherapy on July 28 — starting with Oxaliplatin plus a steroid and immunobooster , then adding more like Vectibix as the regime goes on . “ All of my liver enzymes were out of whack ,” Megan explained , adding that her bilirubin level needs to be 5 or below to take 5FU but was 16 when she started chemo — making clear why Megan was jaundiced . “ The good thing about my third treatment on August 24 is that we were able to add another drug in called Avastin .… It targets the reproductive portion of the cell to slow down and stop reproduction [ so ] the chemo can be more effective .… My treatments will get a lot more intensive once we add that drug in .” Megan is undergoing outpatient chemotherapy every other week at Baptist Health ’ s Cancer Care Center — 12 treatments over the course of six months . The side effects she ’ s experiencing so far include neuropathy , extreme cold sensitivity , fatigue and focus issues . “ I feel better than what I did definitely ,” Megan said , explaining that there had been a moment when she ’ d first gone to the ER when she wasn ’ t sure she ’ d be leaving the hospital alive . “ That ’ s just how bad I felt at the beginning of all this .… I was very , very sick , and I was very scared . I didn ’ t know what was going on .”
A NEW PURPOSE
Given her age and the fact that there was nothing in either her or her family ’ s medical history to indicate Megan might be a candidate for colorectal cancer , she feels that the guidelines for screening this type of cancer needs to be re-evaluated . “ I don ’ t know exactly how I ’ m going to do that yet …,” Megan said . “ In my situation , I wasn ’ t supposed to start getting screened , getting regular colonoscopies , until I was 50 years old .” Megan ’ s situation is even more unique in that she wasn ’ t having any symptoms associated with her bowels . “ I think it ’ s very important obviously if you do have symptoms to go get checked …,” she said , “ but I think there really needs to be some changes made in our expectation of screenings for younger adults . Had I not had this issue with my liver , who knows how long I would have had that [ cancer ] before I ever started showing symptoms ?” Megan has been sharing her journey through her

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