Spoke to my consultant on the 'phone earlier.
The CT scan showed no new disease. Good.
The bloods showed everything (liver, kidneys, etc. etc.) all good but paraproteins up from 2 in August to 3 this time. Not really one thing or the other, so it's another two months of wait'n'see..
But..
My consultant said that the hospital had switched to a new and more sensitive paraprotein test method in July. So we have the possibility that all those zero/undetectables with the old test method might have been small positives if they had been done with the new improved one, and the recent "increases" might not be real increases at all.
I tried to ask some of the questions which spring to mind, but it was over the 'phone and she rather obviously didn't want to say any more. I'll be better prepared with some good questions next time.
Asking if anyone in the Myeloma UK world has heard of changes in the PP testing methods. A quick search hasn't turned up anything.
Just over a week ago I was getting my exercise and daily steps with the Nordic walking poles up and down the corridor here and I somehow tripped over the carpet and had quite a heavy fall. The top of the left pole hit my nose (but luckily missed my eye) - photo taken a few days later when it had started to heal but still very tender. I think I was a bit dazed by that for a few seconds and I have no memory of what happened to my right hand. It was OK for a day or two and then I got serious pain in the right wrist and could barely use that hand for anything. Suspecting a scaphoid fracture (common result of falling on an outstretched hand) I went to A&E on Friday. They took X-rays which the tech said were "inconclusive", and they gave me a Velcro-operated splint to wear. I hate Velcro...
Anyway, it's got better and I was called back to the Fracture Clinic at the hospital and told definitely no fracture, just inflammation and bruising but "a lot of degenerative damage" around the base of the right thumb. Entirely normal for my age, I believe. Just an exceptionally (and excruciatingly) bad case of the "flare-ups" that I get in that area every couple of months or so. And proof, as I've always believed, that exercise is a dangerous habit and really bad for you.
Nevertheless, did 7,000 paces in the park this afternoon and have lost about 7kg over the last two or three months, which I'm pleased about. More still to go! Have I mentioned pre-diabetes? That's for another time.
The wrist experience also involved a long story, yet again, of NHS low-level admin incompetence (and, I have to admit, some of mine mixed in). Basically I was sent to the wrong place and the wrong room at the wrong time. So next time you hear about patients missing appointments, take a moment to wonder whether they actually got the right details of where to be and when. In my experience, quite possibly not.
Oh well, another couple of months of not knowing. That's myeloma for you, always a new twist to deal with.
