STAGE IV

It is common for b-cell lymphomas to be diagnosed at stage IV, which includes bone marrow involvement. Please note that successful treatment is often possible for stage IV disease and bone marrow involvement is reversible. The above statement was copied from a website describing a little about stage IV lymphoma. I found out today that my bone marrow biopsy confirmed that I do have stage IV. Dr. Lindgren went over several approved ways of dealing with this. We concluded that only 2 of these options make any sense for me. One of them entails me being hospitalized for nearly a month at a time. The other one has me on an IV for 3 or 4 days and then off for about 21 days. Those 3 or 4 days may be in the hospital or possibly out-patient. Either way we would do about 4 cycles of treatment and then go through the tests again to see how the lymphoma reacted. He wants my decision on Monday (4/27) and then we begin!