Hi there Nigel, I just read your post and Lucie's response to it, so thought I would send you a message. I am also dealing with bladder cancer now for almost 2 years. I also have lung cancer X2 surgeries, and before that, colon cancer. Interestingly enough, the lung cancer and colon cancers are not related to thebladder cancer. This bladder cancer is in a league of its' own.

I wanted to welcome you to this forum though, because it has literally been a life saver for me with the huge support and encouragement of people on this forum. Even though we are all dealing with various types of cancers, people here are just so encouraging and supportive that it makes it a lot less stressful to deal with. We just all understand that having cancer is difficult, and often discouraging, but when we communicate on here, others understand.

In any case, I have had several cystoscopies, several surgeries, and 3 rounds of BCG treatments. I had a biopsy done Feb. 2nd and will see my urologist on Feb. 26th for the results of the path lab, after which, a decision will be made as to what will take place from here.

It is quite a journey for sure and this bladder cancer thing has been so different from the procedure for my other cancers. There is still a lot that I don't fully understand about the process for treatment, other than right now, there is a world wide shortage of BCG. I don't know what my next step will be once we know what comes out of the path report. All I do know is that so far, my disease is contained within the bladder, but it is considered very aggressive disease. I expect some day, my bladder will have to be removed.

You sound optimistic about your outcome expected, even though they couldn't complete the surgery because of your heart attack. WOW! Perhaps that happened for a reason? Who knows. The important thing right now is that they will treat you with BCG and hopefully, these treatments will do the trick. I understand that they are using BCG sparingly right now because of the shortage. It sounds like you are handling the treatments well so far. I did too, until I got to the 5th dose on the first set of 6 treatments. At that point, I started having some difficulty with side effects. The following sets of 3 treatments were also very difficult with a lot of burning. However, everyone is different and you may not experience and issues with your treatments.

I wish you well, and certainly would like to hear how you get along. There are very few people on here with bladder cancer, so it can be a lonely journey for sure. Its' always good to touch base with others who understand what you're talking about. I'm in Canada and we do have a Bladder Cancer Forum here, but it isn't near as active as this forum. There is some really good info on it though and of course, reliable, so you might want to check it out if you can.

I look forward to hearing about your progress.

Take care.

Lorraine