Abby's Journey Archive

Believe it or not, we just now got finished. Apparently the treatment plan was far more complicated that they originally estimated. A two hour estimate turned into almost five hours. Dr. Loomis told us that she did great being under for that long. She's waking up now, and some of the first words out of her mouth were "when can I eat?"

We haven't heard an official report yet from anyone. We'll write more after we get debriefed.

She's under observation for about an hour, and then she gets a short ambulance ride to Phoenix Children's, where she gets to spend the night.

We were up bright and early this morning--3:45 AM to be exact. We had to leave the house by 4:30 to make sure we made it to Good Sam by our 5:30 AM check-in time. All went fine, Abby was even cheerful despite being awakened at this hour.

We were met by Dr. Loomis, one of Abby's favorite anesthesiologists. He accessed her port, and she pushed her sleepy medicine just like always.

The Stereotactic Radiosurgery process needs an MRI and a CT scan, then the two images are electronically fused together and used to create a treatment plan. A rigid frame is also attached to her head during this time to provide a fixed point of reference for the delivery of the radiation.

The planning process takes 2 to 3 hours. Abby's done with all the scanning right now, but she will still be sleeping throughout. We're just waiting for them to come and tell us the planning process is done, and then we will move down to radiation oncology.