Our main treatment hospital is Vanderbilt Childrens Hospital here in Nashville, TN. He was diagnosed with Stage 4 Neuroblastoma on October 3, 2012 at the age of 4. Before he was officially diagnosed we were in and out of dr offices and
ER's for about 8 months trying to figure out what was doing on. His symptoms were unexplained fevers, no appetite, frequent ear infections, anemia, and stomach pai
n. Since October 3,2012 He has had countless blood and platelet transfusions, Which is normal for any cancer patient. He also has had a dangerous blood stream infection that resulted in him having to have his central line (which is a permant iv line in his chest, they use for chemo and to get blood from) removed and replaced after the antibiotics got rid of the infection. He also got a fungal infection around his lungs. After being on a Anti fungal med for a few months, thankfully it completely disappeared. He has had 7 rounds of chemo.He was supposed to have 6 but he got a extra one since we were waiting on the approval for the surgery that was coming up.
2 surgery's (both by Dr.Laqualia) to remove what was left of the tumor. They both were 8+ hours long. we had to go to NY to have this done since the surgeon's here didn't want to do it cause it was too risky, Since the main tumor was wrapped around the front of his spine. Both surgery's went very well. Way better than anyone expected. They expected him to go to the ICU and be on a breathing machine for a few days but he woke up on this own and did awesome. He only stayed about 4 days in the hospital in a normal room and was able to go home shortly After the two surgery's, He had his Stem cell/Bone marrow transplant along with high dose chemo. He had to stay in the hospital for about three weeks. It went pretty smoothly. After transplant he did 20 rounds of radiation. which were every day for about a month. He had some minor burns on his back a few weeks after he finished but it didn't bother him. He was supposed to start Antibody (Ch 14.18) (which is like a anticancer med that is supposed to prevent it from coming back) after radiation but he didn't qualify. I guess cause he wasn't fully cancer free. As of 04/15/16 Zaids cancer has came back in three new spots. We will start MIBG therapy on 05/03/16. bone marrow test is still pending. As of 10-26-16, We did MIBG therapy and this did not work. We also did 2 rounds of chemo as well and this did not work either. His main hospital, Vanderbilt Childrens has ran out of options for him and doesn't have any treatments he can do. We are currently looking into other hospitals. He has several tumors throughout his body that are continuing to grow. we are starting on a oral chemo on 10/27/16 to see if this will buy us more time to find another trial or treatment that he can do to try to get rid of the cancer.
