So, there I am saying life is settled no dramas and bang!! Sam's scan showed the tumour had returned so a couple of weeks later he's back in QMC Nottingham for yet another long surgical procedure. How lucky are we to have the skills and expertise of the neuro ward on our doorstep?! Following removal the tumour was sent to Belgium, as Sam has been accepted onto the Immune Therapy programme for Dendritic Cell Vaccination at the University Hospital Gasthuisberg in Leuven Belgium. He is being treated by Professor Stefaan Van Gool.
We know how fortunate we are that Sam has been accepted onto this programme and recognise the hard work, and daunting amount of form filling!!!, that has been done by Prof Walker to enable Sam to receive this vaccination therapy.
We now travel to Belgium on a regular basis for the treatment which is not available in the UK. However there was no decision to make once we knew Sam was eligible we were booking Eurostar and packing the bags. Sam has been fantastic, setting off with a smile on a seven hour train journey only a couple of weeks after leaving hospital following an operation of similar length of time.
And, I think I may be becoming a bit of an "anorak" I already almost know, off by heart, the train timetables for the 3 different parts of the journey!!!! Oh nooooo!
The people of Leuven and at the hospital are all really kind, they all try to use english to speak with us, although we have at least learnt that thank you in dutch is dank u! The hospital is massive, Leuven itself has some marvellous architecture and beer!! And it seems to have rained as much as in England......
I am unable to explain the whole of the process here but urge you to look at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENrdTkvlpgw
this will give some idea of his work.
mimm
