If you are still undergoing cancer treatments and think others at your oncologist’s office would benefit from this, you can use Fertile Hope’s Tell Your Doctor tool and they’ll take care of the rest.

A little over a year ago, when hubby and I finally realized that surely I must not be the only childhood cancer survivor who wanted to have a baby, (Hey, sometimes that light bulb takes a little longer to light for some of us…) finding Fertile Hope was the first glimmer of, well, hope for us. An earlier version of this Guide helped steer us in the right direction and connected us with the Reproductive Endocrinologist and clinic that still works with us today.

Even though we are not directly involved in a Fertile Hope program, finding an RE with at least a basic understanding of oncofertility was essential for us. I think that search would have taken much longer without Fertile Hope.

Here’s to hoping that this post shortens a search or two.

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Speaking of Freebie Friday, You have until July 31st to enter to win a $40 Fertility Scope from  Miracle Light Labs. That’s tomorrow! Hurry!

Post from: Blisstree

The 08-09 Cancer & Fertility Resource Guide is here!

A Newsweek article that will be published in the August 4th issue of the magazine gives a great explanation of what Oncofertility is and why it matters so much to cancer patients.

According to Newsweek:

Of the 125,000 people under the age of 45 who are diagnosed with cancer each year, roughly half will receive treatments that will affect their fertility. The cancers that most commonly strike the young—leukemias, lymphomas and breast cancers—require some of the most toxic forms of chemotherapy, which target rapidly growing and fragile cells like hair follicles, sperm and eggs.

The good news: patients who would like to become parents have a growing array of options. Men are benefiting from a procedure that allows urologists to find a single live sperm to bank, which can then be used in an in vitro fertilization method that requires just one sperm. Women can freeze eggs or ovarian tissue, though success rates are still low. Those with partners (or donor sperm) can freeze embryos, the procedure with the best track record, though, like egg freezing, it’s available only to patients who have two to six weeks before starting treatment. On the horizon are less toxic chemotherapy agents as well as methods of shielding eggs and sperm from harm.

But can I just ask that you, dear docs, take a little more care in those “methods of shielding eggs and sperm from harm?”

Before I started the radiation segment of my treatment for Hodgkin’s Disease, someone thought that by pulling my ovaries behind my uterus (which would be shielded from the radiation by a big lead block), that would be good enough. Instead, it took years and several confused ultrasound technicians to finally locate those ovaries again – which were anything but shielded from harm.

I’m just sayin’.

Anyway, this is a nice article in mainstream media that’s not the NY Times (who has had fertility-related articles in nearly every Sunday edition for the last several weeks.) I dig it.

Post from: Blisstree

Newsweek Shines a Light on Oncofertility

And I owe an awful lot to Dr. M. Lois Murphy,

a pediatric oncologist whose leadership advanced early work on chemotherapy, especially for childhood cancer, and led to markedly higher survival rates.

She died in New York earlier this month. Her obituary appeared in the New York Times today.

Drugs and drug combinations she tested and refined are still in use today. The outpatient-based treatments (as opposed to overnight and extended stays) she championed are still the preferred methods of care. But she knew that the cure could sometimes be worse than the disease; She was a pioneer in the field of teratology, and sought to determine how

promising drugs that were intended to attack cancers could breach the placenta and potentially damage a fetus.

With this awareness of the lasting effects of life-saving drugs, could we call her the grandmother of Oncofertility?

Thank you, Dr. Murphy, for your dedication, your life’s work and for raising awareness for those of us who have benefited from the survival rates you helped to increase.

Post from: Blisstree

A Belated Thank You to Dr. M. Lois Murphy

This means I am part of an ever-growing group of young adult survivors of childhood cancers. And finally, finally! thanks to increased odds of remission and survival rates, we are growing large enough in numbers that lasting effects of chemotherapy, radiation and other treatments can be studied and better understood. 20 years ago, we were the guinea pigs – the ones whose families told the doctors, “just make them better! Whatever it takes.” Now we know that curing the cancer is just part of the issue.

I am thankful that I can share information about groups like FertileHope, The SAMFund, the Young Survivor Coalition and others that are popping up every day with you. The creation of the Oncofertility Consortium is a huge step in the right direction. I am heartened to see that the FertilityNotes MySpace now has a handful of friends focused on post-cancer related issues, almost all of them started by young cancer survivors for young cancer survivors. I love seeing announcements like the one Gloria posted today at Cancer Commentary.

I will be even happier when our numbers stop growing, or at least even out. While I am so proud to be among survivors, I am sad that it feels like more and more children have to deal with cancer in the first place.

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Post from: Blisstree

Celebrating 20 Years Cancer Free