189: Steve Harrision survived lung cancer | carboplatin | pleural fusion | pemetrexed | bronchoscopy

When Steve Harrison experienced fatigue, back soreness and shoulder pain in 2024, he attributed it to his "getting old."  He was in his early fifties.  But when he began to have difficulty breathing, he sought medical attention.  Because Steve also had asthma, his doctor had COPD, she prescribed an inhaler.  That did little to no good.  He saw another doctor who ran a variety of tests, which found pleural fusion.  After a bronchoscopy and a biopsy, he was diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer.  In addition to chemotherapy, the oncologist prescribed a TKI inhibitor, known as tagrisso.  After nine treatments, he was taken off chemo, but remains on tagrisso, which is not a cure, but a treatment, and has allowed Steve to get on with his life.  He would say his health is roughly 70-80 percent of what it was, pre-diagnosis.   Steve's San Diego job as a construction inspector was physically stressful.  That's why when was getting tired more often than usual, when he had back and shoulder pain, he did not immediately seek medical attention because he thought it was part of getting old.  But things went from bad to worse.  In addition to having shortness of breath, he began to get night sweats.  He thought he could address these issues with Tylenol and Theraflu.    He finally went to his primary care doctor who listened to his chest, thought he had COPD and gave him an inhaler.  That worked for one day, then didn't work at all.  On a visit to the Grand Canyon, the 6,000-foot elevation really made it tough for him to breath.  In addition, he was constantly tired and sore all over.  Upon returning to San Diego, he went to the emergency room.   Steve underwent a variety of tests.  Doctors found pleural fusion, which is fluid inside the lung.  They said the fluid needed to be removed.  A thoracentesis was performed, which removed about 400cc of a yellowish fluid.  Once it was out, Steve could breathe again.  Then he underwent another test, a biopsy.  It indicated Steve had metastatic Stage IV lung cancer, which had metastasized from the base of his skull to his spine.   The cause of the cancer was a mutation, EGFR exon 19 deletion.  The oncologist prescribed a two-pronged chemotherapy regimen of carboplatin and pemetrexed for the lung and for the mutation, a TKI inhibitor known as tagrisso.    Steve suffered the side effects generally associated with chemotherapy.  During his nine treatments, he experienced fatigue, cognitive issues and food tasted terrible.  His oncologist eventually took him off the chemo, kept him on the tagrisso.   The bone lesions eventually disappeared, and Steve's health has returned to about 70-80 percent of what it was before his diagnosis.  Steve says the tagrisso is not a cure, but does keep his lung cancer at bay.   By way of advice, he says science has come a long way, so much so that a diagnosis of metastatic Stage IV lung cancer should not be considered a death sentence.  He also urges anyone diagnosed with the disease to "dive deep" and stay mentally strong even when it seems that is very hard to do.   Additional Resources:   Support Group:   The A Breath of Hope Lung Foundation  https://www.abreathofhope.org   Steve's YouTube channel  EFGRandme