Shrike and Boomslang

Today I was Googling why lizards puff out their red throats, and eventually ended up on a page about how and why chameleons change color. In part of the article, they discussed color-changing studies performed on chameleons from South Africa whose deadly enemies are the shrike and the boomslang.

Cutest animal species names ever!

A shrike is a little bird and a boomslang is a snake. 

That is all. Just... cute!

So.... we were in Dallas on Friday for Lauren to see the neurosurgeon there for a second opinion on the brain tumor. Boiling it WAY down, the neurosurgeon said that she doesn't think the mass on the MRIs has grown in the six months between images. Not that it absolutely isn't a brain tumor (they have ruled out most of the other things it could be), but it may not be, after all. She, like the local team, recommended another MRI in a few months. If it doesn't grow, it may be tissue affected by a previous unrecognized seizure or even just an artifact in the imaging due to who-knows-what. The hippocampus is an area prone to artifacts, she said.

Even if it does turn out to be a tumor, it is extremely slow growing and she would not do surgery until Lauren showed symptoms or the tumor became more aggressive. She explained that if she removed the left hippocampus now, Lauren would have a marked defect in her short-term memory; whereas, if she waits for the brain to recognize a deficit due to the tumor, it will start the amazing rewiring process to use the right hippocampus for short-term memory. If enough rewiring occurred prior to doing surgery, she could much more safely remove the hippocampus without as much damage to memory. Makes sense.

It's not a good area to do a biopsy, so that isn't recommended either, when you aren't sure what you're looking at and the patient is asymptomatic.

Incidentally a neurosurgeon with whom we work at my company took a look at Lauren's films and tests and said he doesn't think the area identified on the scans has grown either. He also recommended just following up with an MRI in a few months.

So I guess she'll be having an MRI in a few months! The news is very good in that it may not be a tumor, but it is also incredibly frustrating and overwhelming for her, to be told she has cancer, deal with that for six weeks and then the team takes a step back, to say they want to wait and do more tests. Tough situation all around, but at least it seems everyone is on the same page now.

Now we all need a VACATION!!