When It All Started
When Lance was born, he had hydrocelphus and underwent surgery to implant a shunt. This was suppose to be a one/time surgery. The shunt failed.... and failed repeatedly, which involved additional surgeries until the tumor was discovered. Shortly thereafter it was determined he was born with it which caused the hydrocelphus and the continual shunt failures. His prognosis was poor. After the brain surgery, which removed 90% of the tumor, the remaining 10% was treated with chemotherapy at first. That didn't shrink the tumor, and his prognosis remained poor. It was predicted he would not survive to his first Thanksgiving; when he did, the doctors said he would be lucky to make his first Christmas. He was very weak, fed through tubes, listless, but he was there and he made it through that first Christmas last year! He was undergoing radiation by then, still with dire predictions from the doctors. He continued to lose weight (he was 27 pounds at the beginning of treatment; 17.5 pounds in March when the treatment stopped). He was bald, skinny, didn't smile, but he was there! When the tumor was pronounced in remission, only the doctors were surprised. Lance was the subject of many, many prayer lists, including an internet one that literally stretched worldwide! Because of radiation to the spine, it was predicted that Lance would not stand up by himself and would never walk. He also has a "lazy eye" and might have to wear glasses, the tumor had rested over an eye nerve. He also has a slight loss of hearing. A little history -- Lance has had 9 operations with the shortest being 15 min. for the hickman removal on June 2, 1997 to the longest being 6 hours on Sept, 26 1996 for the tumor resection. He had chemo for 7 weeks and a MRI indicated that it wasn't working so radiation was started Jan. 2 `97 and finished Mar. 5 `97 with intermitment stops and starts because of low counts. He had a total of 6 weeks radiation. Lance is currently being treated at the Packard's Children Hospital, located in Stanford, Palo Alto, California.