I had an appointment Dr. Pain (aka Prof. Vogl) for another TACE treatment in Frankfurt. The man is a true master at inflicting severe pain. In comparison, my root canal dentist, whom I previously held in high esteem on the pain scale, proved to be a mere amateur. Please don’t get the wrong impression however, I am not being negative in any way towards Prof. Vogl. As much as I hate it, I welcome the pain because to me it means that his treatments are having an impact.
Psychologically the second round with Prof. Vogl was much harder than the first. The reason was that I already knew what to expect, and if you saw my post on the first procedure, you will recall that it was brutal. An experience that for me re-defined the meaning of pain. It took a supreme effort of willpower to willingly climb up on his table again.
The procedure was very quick and efficient. Within minutes Prof. Vogl found his way to the hepatic artery. As expected, few minutes after the chemo drugs were injected through a catheter inserted through my groin into the liver, the pain began. Lots of pain. I was however pleasantly surprised. The pain never reached the levels I experienced during the first treatment and it went away altogether within an hour. I still needed lots of morphine, but compared to my first TACE, this was a walk in the park.
To get the maximum benefit, I had local hyperthermia just after the TACE procedure at a nearby clinic. This time I stayed overnight in Frankfurt, which gave me a chance to get some IVs as an outpatient and a second Local Hyperthermia treatment the following day before departing for Removab at Hallwang.
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