Richard Husby is a retired elementary teacher. The grandfather plays the concertina, or squeezebox, for fun. He enjoys all types of music, as it provides a rhythm for a bountiful life.
He and his wife Marla squeeze as much enjoyment into their lives as possible, because cancer almost squeezed the life out of him.
“I went to my doctor for my annual physical, and I said my feet are just burning all the time and my fingers go numb,” explains Richard.
Doctors initially thought that Richard was suffering from nerve damage. But a colonoscopy revealed that he had a neuroendocrine tumor, or NET tumor, in his small intestine.
“Doctors removed that tumor by surgery, and my peripheral neuropathy symptoms totally disappeared,” said Richard.
But in 2016, his symptoms came back. More tumors were found in his liver; one of them, inoperable.
Standard chemotherapy and radiation don't work for NET tumors, so Richard sought out a second opinion and found specialist Dr. Hagen Kennecke at Virginia Mason Hospital.
“All these neuroendocrine tumors, they secrete things into the blood, and you get quite a few side effects from the cancer itself,” explains Dr. Kennecke.
Richard was no stranger to the side effects of his cancer, suffering debilitating headaches and pain in his body. That's why he was filled with hope when he heard about a clinical trial for a drug called Lutathera. And it just so happened Doctor Kennecke was leading that trial in Seattle, but Richard had to qualify.
“Three weeks later I still hadn't heard from him. And so I said: 'Has any decision been made?' And he just wrote back: 'You're in.' And at that point, I was kind of excited,” says Richard.
Lutathera is a cancer-targeting drug using radioactively charged proteins to seek and attack the cancer cells.
“It's a small protein peptide we collect and that goes in intravenously, and it finds the cancer and only binds to the cancer,” said Dr. Kennecke.
The drug is administered in about 30 minutes, and patients are given specific medications to protect the liver during the treatment.
Richard is responding well. He is active and out of pain, chopping wood as the drug chops away his cancer.
He says Lutathera has changed his life. Less than a year ago, he was putting his faith in God and getting his affairs in order.
“I started consolidating finances - making things easier for when I died, easier for Marla,” said Richard.
Now he's back to planning for the future.
“Our 50th wedding anniversary is coming up in a couple of years, and I was thinking: I wonder if I'll make it to 50? Now I'm thinking, I think we're gonna make it to 50, Lord willing,” said Richard.
Dr. Kennecke tells us the same principles used to treat NET tumors can be applied to prostate cancer and breast cancer in the future.
As for Richard, he will continue to get scans. If cancer does come back, they will consider retreating him, though Richard believes he is done with cancer for good.
