June 1st, 2009

We got a call from the neurosurgeon tonight. He said the spinal tap did not pick up the tumor markers. He said what he thinks is happening is that the cyst is surrounding the tumor(in other words the tumor is inside the cyst), therefore the spinal fluid would not pick it up. We talked in great length about what to do next, and after weighing all the options we have decided to wait 3 months and do another MRI and see what is happening then. He feels that it is most likely benign and not malignant due to the slow growth, but could not guarantee that. We also felt that because it does not appear to be causing any harm to her at this point, that we would wait as a biopsy is risky. He gave us the choice as to what we wanted, and we decided that waiting would be better at this point, as she is already going through enough with the Lyme Disease. He agreed that was a good decision, and told us what symptoms to look for that would be indicative of the tumor growing and applying pressure. If in 3 months it has grown again, then we will have to do the biopsy and they would either remove it, which is complicated, or shrink it with radiation/chemo. So we will wait and see how things go, and work on getting her better from the Lyme in the meantime.