The Power of Love
The Power of Love, by Andy Fairclough
Natalie continues to improve in Germany but the future remains uncertain. Her incredible story will be featured on Seven Network’s Sunday Night programme to be aired Sunday 6th March at 630pm on Channel Seven.
The sun has been shining for the last week or so here in Wurzburg Germany and, after a long cold winter, it feels as though spring is in the air. Natalie is almost at the end of the third cycle of treatment with Blinatumomab and she continues to gain strength and weight.
The next stage in Natalie’s treatment is difficult to call at present and Professor Topp is considering the options. The first step is a ‘chimerism’ analysis to determine the proportion of donor T cells currently present in her blood stream. The outcome of this will inform the treatment recommendation.
If the T cells in her blood belong 100% to her bone marrow donor then she may be advised to have another bone marrow transplant from a different donor with all the inherent risks that carries. If she has less than 100% donor cells she is likely to receive a further infusion of stem cells from the original donor to try and displace her own cells and induce an immunological response against the Leukaemia.
A third option is that she does not receive any further stem cell treatment at this stage and we rely on maturation of an immunological response from the original donor and hope this will be sufficient to prevent a further relapse.
Because this is a trial there is little past data on which to base decisions and Max Topp and the other scientists developing the treatment have to be very careful in their assessments. We have been advised today that the results for other patients on Natalie’s trial are equally astounding and that the doctors here in Germany will now move the trial forwards as quickly as possible so as to validate their assumptions with further data. This is great news and offers real hope that this amazing drug will change the face of treatment for certain types of blood cancer.
Participation in this drug trial has been very expensive. It has become clear to me that without the generous support we have received from friends and well-wishers, this undertaking could have been financially ruinous for us. It is also clear that for many others it might be simply too expensive to participate at all. With this in mind Professor Topp and I have established a charitable trust called the ‘Save Natalie Foundation’.
The ‘Save Natalie Foundation’ has the very specific objective of supporting Natalie and other patients who participate in the ground breaking and potentially lifesaving clinical trials for Leukaemia currently underway at the University Hospital in Wurzburg Germany.
For further information or to make a donation please follow the link: http://www.flyingfishonline.com/helpnat
