1/14/2024 0 Comments Monish sharma iscribe![]() As it turned out, we didn’t because it disappeared. We were fully expecting that at some point it would grow and we’d have to put her back on chemotherapy. “The tumors kept shrinking and shrinking and then finally were gone. “It evolved into what we call a complete response after the chemotherapy was stopped,” Sharma said. "The tumors kept shrinking and shrinking and then finally were gone." Remarkably, Harrigan’s cancer kept responding positively to the treatment. ![]() Typically, Sharma said, the cancer will grow during this break period. She continued treatment for eight months before she was given a break to allow her body a chance to rest. Harrigan qualified for the trial and began a regimen of chemotherapy every two weeks. The trial tested a combination of chemotherapies that work by blocking angiogenesis - the growth of new blood vessels - to prevent tumor growth. Medical oncologist Manish Sharma, MD, had recently developed a clinical trial for metastatic colorectal cancer that studied how patients tolerate higher doses of certain standard chemotherapy treatments. I just said that I wasn’t going to let it get me down.” “But, I know you don’t get anywhere without a positive mental attitude. Her mother’s cancer had spread to the liver and lymph nodes. Nearly 20 years later, Thompson was back at UChicago Medicine, this time with her mother. When my mother got sick, there was no question where I was taking her.” There are truly no words to describe that kind of comfort and security. Whether you're a patient or a caregiver you can reach your doctor, their assistant, your nurses - even the grill guy in the cafe - in minutes. You become part of a team that cradles you all the way. "At UChicago Medicine, from day one they take the fear out of your diagnosis. “For all the things that were wrong, everything went really well,” Thompson said. It was a long road to recovery, and she continues to be grateful for her transplant care team. In February 1991, Thompson received the bone marrow transplant and went from near death to complete remission. Fortunately, Thompson’s doctors discovered her brother was a perfect match for a bone marrow transplant, which another hospital had failed to identify. She soon learned her cancer carried the Philadelphia chromosome, a mutation that is relatively uncommon in ALL and is associated with poorer survival outcomes. ![]() Thompson was rejected by multiple hospitals before a doctor at UChicago Medicine agreed to take her case. ALL is less common and harder to treat in adults than in children. That's because Harrigan’s daughter Debby Thompson had been a patient at UChicago Medicine in the early 1990s when she battled stage 4 acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) at age 34. When Indiana resident Margaret Harrigan was diagnosed with stage 4 colorectal cancer at age 73, she knew exactly where she needed to go for treatment: the University of Chicago Medicine.
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