From relapse to recovery | Corewell Health

Sue Lokker has helped a whole lot of sufferers dealing with a most cancers analysis.

A Corewell Well being interventional radiology nurse, she ceaselessly calls sufferers who’re scheduled for needle biopsies or for line placements for chemotherapy or stem cell assortment and finally transplant.

She had not often missed a day of labor throughout her 35 years as a nurse till August 2021, when she underwent a hysterectomy for endometrial most cancers.

“That was discovered very early,” she mentioned. “It was microscopic.”

All appeared nicely till a few days earlier than a routine post-operative appointment.

However that morning, “I seen an enormous lump in my neck,” Sue mentioned. At first, she thought maybe she’d pulled a muscle.

Her physician ordered an ultrasound. She’d additionally had a breast MRI that week, a part of her routine care due to a household historical past of breast most cancers.

“They discovered that my chest was stuffed with enlarged lymph nodes,” Sue mentioned.

A needle biopsy revealed Hodgkin’s lymphoma. “That was an enormous blow,” she mentioned.

Identical to that, Sue went from caregiver to affected person.

An surprising relapse

Sometimes, Hodgkin’s lymphoma responds nicely to chemotherapy, with a treatment charge of 80 to 90 %. Sue felt optimistic going into remedy, which concerned six cycles of chemotherapy each different week.

“I truly did rather well,” she mentioned, noting she skilled some fatigue however no main unintended effects. “I labored the entire time.”

As an interventional radiology nurse, Sue interacted with a number of sufferers with Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

“That was one of many robust issues after I was working,” she mentioned. “You’d open up a affected person’s chart and also you’d see, ‘Oh, their lymphoma got here again.’”

A month or two after her final infusion, a PET scan revealed an enlarged lymph node. A follow-up scan revealed spots on her chest and in her armpit.

Sue, 57, returned to interventional radiology, this time as a affected person. After a needle biopsy failed to supply an enough specimen, she underwent a surgical process.

Her Hodgkin’s lymphoma was again.

The magic quantity

That’s when she met with Rupin Shah, MD, a doctor with Corewell Well being’s Blood and Marrow Transplant program.

The subsequent line of protection for sufferers with a relapse of Hodgkin’s lymphoma is an autologous stem cell transplant. In an autologous transplant, stem cells are taken from the affected person versus a donor.

“It may possibly treatment a big variety of sufferers,” Dr. Shah mentioned.

Dr. Shah had not met Sue earlier than however ceaselessly consults with interventional radiology to have strains positioned previous to stem cell transplants.

“She by no means imagined she’d be in that place,” he mentioned.

The BMT staff decided that Sue could be a superb candidate—she had a help system and was in good bodily form. She would wish all these sources for the trail forward.

She would bear three rounds of intense, in-patient chemotherapy.

“You employ second-line chemotherapy to attempt to put the illness again into remission earlier than transplant,” Dr. Shah mentioned. “In Sue’s case it was an entire response and that offers us a sign that she’ll do nicely and hopefully stays in remission.”

The subsequent section of remedy concerned accumulating her stem cells. The magic quantity: 3 million.

To arrange, Sue needed to give herself each day injections to stimulate cell manufacturing.

Every morning, her mom, Donna Grooters, would drive her from her Hudsonville residence to Corewell Well being’s bone and marrow transplant clinic to search out out whether or not she had hit her purpose.

“The [bone and marrow transplant] staff is so fantastic,” Sue mentioned. “I feel they had been as disillusioned as I used to be day by day when it didn’t occur.”

When it did, the staff despatched her texts with balloons and occasion hats. The transplant was on.

Ten days later, Sue was admitted for six days of high-intensity chemotherapy aimed toward eradicating the lymphoma. It additionally wipes out the bone marrow and causes unintended effects together with hair loss, mouth sores and nausea.

An emotional day

Transplant day lastly arrived—on Dec. 1, 2022—which additionally marked the staff’s 1,000th mobile infusion.

On one hand, the one to two-hour course of felt “anti-climactic,” Sue mentioned.

“Alternatively it was so emotional, as a result of the method to get there’s simply so taxing,” she mentioned.

The times after the transplant would even be taxing, when the unintended effects of the extreme chemo entered excessive gear: nausea, no urge for food, rashes, mouth sores and fatigue.

Her physician and nurses gave her three jobs: Drink, eat and transfer.

“And have a optimistic angle,” Sue mentioned. “You assume it’s sounds simple, but it surely’s not whenever you don’t have an urge for food and don’t really feel good.”

However Sue adopted their directions to a T, logging 70 kilometers strolling the hallway of the BMT unit.

When the hospital meals didn’t enchantment, her husband, Dan, introduced up treats from the cafeteria.

“The staff, the employees on that flooring, was simply superb,” she mentioned. “It’s not like something I’ve ever seen.”

All through her remedy, Sue leaned on household, pals, her church neighborhood and her religion.

“It helped me by way of a lot,” she mentioned. “I do know there’s a plan. And God’s been in each element.”

Subsequent to her favourite chair is a field jam-packed with playing cards and letters from family and friends, together with a plaque that reads: “In all issues give thanks.”

That sense of gratitude has buoyed Sue all through her most cancers journey.

One night time, within the midst of remedy, she couldn’t sleep.

“And all I may consider was what number of blessings I’ve,” she mentioned.

“Individuals ask, ‘How will you be so optimistic?’” Sue mentioned. “I couldn’t consider one unfavourable thought. All I may consider had been all of the blessings of my household and pals.”

A well-known wake-up name

Sue returned residence after simply 20 days within the hospital—wanting the common monthlong keep.

She smiles as remembers the primary morning.

Within the hospital, the nightly soundscape consists principally of the ding of name lights.

Her neighbors have a goats and donkeys that bray within the morning.

“I’m mendacity in mattress within the morning and heard these donkeys braying and I mentioned, ‘I’m residence!” she mentioned. “It’s the donkeys, not the decision lights!”

“You’re actually drained initially,” she mentioned of the primary weeks post-transplant. She has step by step regained energy, strolling each day, feeding the donkeys, even venturing out to lunch or dinner with pals.

Sue has carried out “exceedingly nicely,” Dr. Shah mentioned. Her PET scans present that she stays in full remission.

The subsequent section of remedy entails immunotherapy infusions, given each three weeks for a 12 months.

As she continues her restoration, now she and her mom spend time on their ordinary routines: grocery procuring, lunch outings and thrift procuring, as a substitute of journeys to Corewell Well being.

Sue seems to be ahead to touring once more, beginning in April with a visit to Utah the place she hopes to cross mountaineering by way of a slot canyon off her bucket listing. She’s additionally wanting ahead to tenting and gardening.

On March 2, Sue returned to work. Her private expertise, she mentioned, “will change my observe going ahead.”

“It additionally makes you understand how all people’s obtained a narrative,” she mentioned. “It makes you might have extra grace that you just lengthen to different folks since you don’t know what problem they’re going by way of.”