Baylor Passes on Karl

Well, the meeting at Baylor wasn't as uplifting as we thought. Their melanoma trials for vaccine Karl doesn't qualify for because he's had brain tumors or has had too many brain tumors. We were informed that we will be out of luck getting him on a vaccine trial for melanoma no matter where we go because of his brain tumors. So we are not holding any hope that MD Anderson is going to give us a different answer.
Karl doesn't qualify for any clinical trials right now because he has had radiation and chemotherapy. So that puts him out of luck for at least a month or two. We don't think we can forgo the chemotherapy to risk getting in a general clinical trial that isn't specific to melanoma. Also because his disease is still being agressive and not showing signs of letting up. Most of the general clinical trials are phase I (experimental), take anyone (guinea pigs) and don't offer much (no idea if it will work). Versus the melanoma vaccines which are phase III (pre FDA approval, proven to work). So we go back to the drawing board with Dr. Wyzinski to see what other options Karl might have to help slow down the progression of the disease---Maybe we will be taking a medical vacation to Canada or Mexico or something... ;-)