Donna Knapp is Kickin' Cancer's Butt

(Written by Sara, Donna's daughter)

For those that don't know, mom has been diagnosed with Stage IV Primary Peritoneal Cancer (PPC). 

Donna is a homecare pediatic nurse, who has spent the past 20 years spending 60+ hours per week helping cirtically ill kiddos and their families. As of February 1, she changed jobs to working with a different nursing agency. She must work for an average number of hours per week for 90 days before benefits are offered (including health insurance, PTO, short and long term disability, etc.).  With her diagnosis and treatment plan, she will not be able to meet that requirement by the time Cobra coverage ends on July 31, 2020; she will not be able to work at all during this time.  

How You Can Help!
Many people have been reaching out asking what they can do to help. Here's what we can use:
1. Lots of prayers and good vibes! We are trusting in our Almighty Healer, and we can use all the prayers we can get! Specific prayers for the following:
- Wisdom for and compassion from the medical team throughout this journey
- Comfort for us all as we navigate this process
- That God's will be done and His grace and wonder be shown throughout the many months to come
- That mom will get off oxygen as soon as possible (doing better, but not quite there yet!)
- That mom tolerates chemo relatively well and stays in good spirits while she kick's cancer's (and chemo's) butt! This will not be easy for her, but we are trusting in our Almighty Healer to get us through physically, emotionally, and financially.

2. Mom is wanting her tribe of local friends and family to join us at church Sunday morning. We'd love to see you at Zion Baptist Church in Covington for the 10:15am service on Sunday, March 8th. Address is 7037 GA-212, Covington, GA 30016

3. While she loves all of you and truly appreciates offers for company, we are keeping visitors to a minimum as she starts chemo during flu (and apparently coronavirus) season. She, Nanny, or I will reach out when she is up for visitors.

4. In lieu of flowers, please consider reaching out in some practical needs we will have in the coming months (meals, favorite snacks/entertainment for chemo treatments, helping with transportation, gas/grocery cards, meal train, this GoFundMe Campaign, funny stories about things going on in your life to make her smile, etc).

We are speaking all positive things here! Mom is ready to fight and kick cancer's booty...and we all know how stubborn she is, ha! Mom is up for all of the uplifting, joyous messages. She will answer as she can. Please reach out to me (Sara) with any questions you may have and I will answer as I can. If you don't have my number, send me a message or text mom's phone and I'll get it to you.

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Donna's Story:
On Wednesday, February 26th, she went to her doctor because she was having trouble breathing. This had started a few days before when she was trying to sleep, but it had escalated so that she could not walk to the bathroom without gasping for air. Once she arrived at her primary care doctor, they did an EKG and found that she was in acute tachycardia. Paired with her breathing problems, they sent her to the ER at Piedmont Henry. After a long wait, she was brought back to be seen in the ER. They did a chest x-ray and she was told that her right lung was filled with fluid. They suspected a pulmonary embolism (PE), and they admitted her. Over the next several days, numerous tests were conducted. We found out that the fluid was actually around her lung, not inside it, so they performed two thoracentesies, draining over 2500mL from around her lung. Doctors ran more tests to determine the cause of the build up. They performed an echocardiogram and confirmed it was not her heart, as well as many blood tests to rule out chronic inflammatory/autoimmune diseases. They also sent out the fluid around her lung for testing (cytology workup) to see if there were any cancer cells present.

On Monday, March 2nd, the cytology came back positive for cancer cells of gynecological origin. She was transferred to Piedmont Atlanta Hospital where they were better able to diagnose and treat her. Since Monday, we have learned that her tumor markers for ovarian cancer are through the charts, as well as elevated tumor markers for pancreatic/gallbladder cancer. Because the fluid around her lungs contained these ovarian cancer cells, this means she has Stage IV Cancer.

On Thursday, March 5th, her oncologist conducted an abdominal exploratory laparoscopic surgery. It went relatively well. Unfortunately, they could not put the port in because of the blood clot in her leg. Instead, they put a PICC line in, and she will use that for her first round of chemo. The plan is to put in a port sometime before her next round of chemo.

On Wednesday, March 6th, mom started chemotherapy. They are wanted to her to start on chemo ASAP as it will dry up the fluid that is still around her lungs and prevent more from forming. She will be on two different types of chemotherapy, Taxol and Carboplatinum. Chemo treatments will last 8-10 hours each time. Pre-meds, such as anti-nausea meds, will be administered first, then Taxol, and then Carboplatinum. After the completion of the first round of chemo, the oncologist cleared her to go home. However, she will need to be discharged by the internal medicine doctor, Dr. Lamb. She is monitoring her blood clotting levels, since mom has the clot in her leg. Mom has been on IV Heparin since she was done with her surgery yesterday, and they come in and take blood about every two hours. Once it reaches a certain point, she will be able to switch to oral blood thinners (which we were just given some awesome coupons for, yay!) and come home! We are hoping this will be tomorrow (Saturday, March 7th).

On Monday, we will call Dr. McBroom's office and speak to the chemo nurse there, Gretchen. She will help up set up our plan for her second chemo treatment. For her next treatment, we will be admitted into the hospital again for another 3-4 days. They will need to get her off of her oral blood thinner and back on IV Heparin. After she's been on the IV for 6-12 hours, they will stop it and take her to surgery to put in her port. Once surgery is over, they will start the Heparin IV again, and she will stay in the hospital for chemo. Then they'll switch her back over to the oral blood thinner and she will be able to go home. Her third chemo treatment, and all others going forward, will be in the outpatient office. After the third treatment, they will schedule her surgery (early to mid May). They like to keep all parts on the plan on a three-week basis. That means that three weeks following Round 3, she will have surgery. Three weeks after surgery, they will start the fourth treatment (and so on). Surgery recovery will be a while (6-8 week minimum).

From there, we will run more tests and see where we are...praying for remission!