Kansas City, Kan -- A year of treatment and 10 rounds of chemo, cancer was still in Ricky Reece’s body.
41 Action News Anchor Kevin Holmes met the 60-year-old veteran in February when he was set to take part in a brand-new type of treatment, just approved by the FDA.
CAR T, is an immunotherapy that extracts white cells, re-engineers those cells and then re-infuses them into a patient’s body.
Some people have died during treatment, but a 50 percent chance for remission is better odds than what Reece has faced before.
“These are patients who had a 7 percent chance they were going to have complete remission,” Dr. Joseph McGuirk with the University of Kansas Cancer Center reminds us.
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It takes 30 days to see if the re-engineered cells are working.
Earlier this week marked day 30 of Reece’s treatments, a day when Reece would go into the doctor for an update on how things worked.
Before he stepped into the doctor’s office, a hospital employee asked him a series of simple questions, and to write a complete sentence.
Reece wrote, “I am going home today.”
During the 30 days of treatment, some tasks proved too much for Reece, but being able to answer the questions and write a complete sentence gave McGuirk hope.
“It’s a sign the t-cells are releasing molecules,” the doctor said.
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After about 90-minutes of waiting, the doctor walked into the room.
The Day 30 appointment serves as an important fork in the road for the treatment. The doctor says it’s where “the rubber meets the road.”
For Reece, that road could be a path where he and his wife return to work until retirement in December.
Or it could be a path that’s more bleak.
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Before the doctor gives the update, Reece has a more burning question.
“I’m wanting chicken wings really bad,” Reece said. “Can I do take out?”
McGuirk told him yes.
And then McGuirk passed along the other news.
Reece was showing impressive gains in his cancer fight that previous treatments didn’t produce.
He wasn’t in remission yet, McGuirk told Reece, but there was progress.
The news left Reece upbeat and optimistic.
“Beats the hell out of relapse,” he said.
