On July 15, 2013 I went to Duke Clinic in Durham, NC and saw Dr. Lake Morrison after having a CT scan and a breathing test there earlier that day. The bottom line is that according to Dr. Morrison the CT scan was markedly improved and showed little signs of inflammation now with most of the cloudiness having cleared. There was still evidence of some permanent scarring, but not as much as expected. The breathing test results were also much improved, and while there is still some problem with the exchange of Oxygen and CO2, the breathing test results according to Dr. Morrison were close to normal. I also basically had no difficulty with shortness of breath or pain in taking the breathing test at Duke, unlike when I had taken the breathing test in Asheville and was short of breath and in some pain trying to perform the prescribed breathing tests on the machine. Dr. Morrison was impressed with my progress and seemed to think that it was due primarily to the high dose of prednisone I am taking, but since I know that my symptoms (dyspnea or shortness of breath as well as experiencing pain in taking deep breaths, in addition to not hearing the crackling velcro-like sounds of fibrosis anymore) were improving and had basically gone away by the time I started the heavy doses of prednisone at 60 mg/day on June 11, 2013. Therefore, I really think that the diet and exercise I have been doing so conscientiously have made a big difference in my improvement. I have also been getting acupuncture treatments for a couple of months now, averaging 1 treatment every week or two, and this too may have also played a role in my good progress. Because of my good progress, Dr. Morrison is recommending a little faster taper on the prednisone dose than I had originally thought there would be? He is now recommending that I drop from the current dose of 40 mg/day to 30 mg/day beginning Aug. 11. After that he wants the dosage to drop to 20 mg/day beginning September 11, and to hold it there for a few months while monitoring me with breathing tests to be sure all is going well.
I also need to follow up with Dr. Morrison since he has had a chance to now look at the slides of the biopsy and find out what he thinks about the Mayo Clinic pathology report diagnosis of DIP and/or NSIP. I also want to follow up with him about getting some better interpretation (including normal ranges) for the breathing test results from Duke, so I can better understand the data and what the results mean.
On July 16, the following day, I met with Dr. Adam Perlman, Director of Duke Integrative Medicine for a new patient consultation. He said he thought I was doing everything right, and to be sure and do what I can to eat anti-inflammatory foods and to eat less sugar and wheat, etc. He also recommended that I continue acupuncture and start taking turmeric as an anti-inflammatory supplement to my diet. He also mentioned one other supplement that I will have to look up, as I don't recall the name right now. But all-in-all the consultation with Dr. Perlman was very positive and reinforced what I am already proactively doing! I continue to feel great, better than I have felt in 20 years, and I am now down to about 172 pounds! I'd like to lose another 10 or 15 pounds and then stay between 150 and 160 pounds. That would be an ideal weight! I am currently walking 3.5 miles a day, 7 days a week! I am convinced this has really helped me lose weight, along with the three 20-second spurts I am doing during the last few laps of my walk. The 5:2 Intermittent Fast Diet has also helped tremendously, but my progress has slowed a bit on the diet as we have had to abandon it a couple of times recently due to birthday parties and other distractions, but we hope to get back on track with that and I'd like to see my weight drop to 170 in the next week!
