Becoming Your Own Advocate
Mort and I have written (probably redundantly!) about the importance of becoming your own best advocate, and that includes questioning all the possible treatment options that may be available to you. As all of you know, there are many types of lymphoma - and there are many types of treatments that may be available but not offered. Sadly, radioimmunotherapy often falls into this category, and yet nothing has yet, to my knowledge, been proven to be more effective for follicular lymphoma.
Why is this? One of the main reasons seems to be that few oncologists are equipped to deliver radioimmunotherapy. They must refer their patients to nuclear medicine physicians or radiation oncologists who then administer the drug. On the other hand, most oncologists can easily administer chemotherapy or Rituxan.
It's no longer enough to accept any doctor's treatment recommendation without question. Too many new options are available and/or being studied in clinical trials, and it would be difficult for all but the most specialized doctors to keep up with all the new information.
So - don't worry about offending your doctor if you ask questions such as "Is there anything else that would be a better solution?" or "What else is currently available?" In the case of radioimmunotherapy, it is quite distressing to hear patients say that their doctors tell them it's too new. As I have said before, Bexxar and Zevalin have been studied for 16 and 13 years respectively - that ain't new, folks!
Betsy