Januari 06, 2017
00:18comm: what would you do if you found out you had a condition that meant you couldn’tstop growing? 00:24tanya: it’s like i woke up one day and was godzilla. 00:31comm: how would you react if one morning you didn’t recognise yourself in the mirror? 00:36dr oyesiku: nobodies protected. they literally just wake up and they have the condition. 00:43mary: i have not felt normal in so long.
00:46comm: how would you cope with a condition that can change your life beyond recognition? 00:50igor: the world is just a very uncomfortable place for someone my size 00:56karen: how can something change someone so fast. 01:17comm: igor vovkovinsky lives in rochester, minnesota. 27 year-old igor suffers from acromegalicgigantism and at 7ft 8’ he towers over his mum, who he lives with.
01:34igor: you making coffee for breakfast? 01:39comm: symptoms of gigantism include rapid upward growth. 01:44igor: being tall makes the world very annoying. every structure that i go into is too small,too short. i end up hitting my head on all the exit signs. the world is just a very uncomfortableplace for someone my size. 02:01comm: igor was born in the ukraine and his size became a problem from a very early age. 02:07svetlana: when igor was born he was growing
too fast. at the age 4,5,6 months he alreadywas size of 1 year old kid. usually when kids are born and if they are big size born, inmy home country actually people are happy. but when he was 6 months old and weighed 13kilos i thought it was a little too heavy. a little too big. i went to see the doctorsand it was the first time he say to me it has gigantism, when he was six months old. 02:41comm: gigantism is caused by a tumour on the pituitary gland inside the brain. this tumourproduces an excess of growth hormone which is pumped into the body. if a person suffersthe brain tumour before the end of puberty then the condition is called acromegalic gigantismand results in the patient growing to massive
heights, like igor. but if a person developsthe tumour post puberty then the condition is called acromegaly and the patient growsoutwards rather than upwards. acromegaly affects three to four out of every million peopleeach year. 03:16dr jakoby: what most individuals notice right away is that there’s a characteristic facialappearance of individuals with acromegaly. the frontal bones become broadened and enlargedand more prominent. the nose enlarges. the facial features and skin coarsen. the jawbecomes more prominent. another striking feature of acromegaly is the significant enlargementof the hands and feet and you read descriptions of patients with acromegaly have spade likehands and spade like feet. the fingers and
toes thicken and the palms and soles widenand get thickened as well. 03:52comm: both acromegaly and acromegalic gigantism can result in severe disfigurement, seriousdisorders such as heart problems and strokes, and premature death, if untreated. 04:06comm: doctors in the ukraine were unable to perform a much needed operation to removeigor’s brain tumour, meaning he continued to grow. so, when he was seven, and alreadystanding six feet tall, igor and his mum moved to america, where doctors were able to carryout the operation. 04:25svetlana: the surgery saved his life but he
still was growing after surgery for many moreyears. none of us expected that. i always thought that after surgery he would stop growingbut his brain was already affected by tumour and still was producing growth hormone. 04:46comm: igor eventually stopped growing when he was 20 years old.but not until he’d hit an amazing 7ft 8’ – making him one the tallest men in theworld. 05:02igor: gigantism has affected me that i feel that i no longer feel that l fit into anypart of society and that’s a feeling that i’ve had ever since i went to middle schooland high school.
05:16comm: igor has recently enrolled at college to continue his education, which has beenbadly interrupted by his condition. 05:41comm: he’s studying to become a lawyer and attends five classes a week. 05:50igor: i’m used to always sitting in the small chairs and sitting at the small tablesand it’s uncomfortable but i don’t want to make an extra fuss about it so i’m usedto bending over and sitting in the little chairs and writing at the little desks. 06:08comm: igor’s school life has not always
run smoothly. 06:12igor: high school was a terrible experience. all four years of high school were just incrediblyharsh. i never had anybody to talk to during school or after school. i never sat with anybodyat lunch. high school was just four miserable years because i was just standing out of thecrowd and didn’t fit into any group, any social group and it felt like i was a nuisanceto everybody in school. 06:39comm: despite his difficult experience during high school, the medical help igor has receiveddrives his desire to be a lawyer. 06:46igor: a lot of people have helped us over
these years that we’ve lived here and ifeel that more people should have the opportunity to receive the help that i did. 06:56comm: although his height means he struggles to be accepted in his everyday life, as we’llsee igor does make a big impression at the very highest level. 07:05i just want to make some special acknowledgments. the biggest obama fan in the country is inthe house. 07:18comm: tanya angus was a beautiful young girl. she loved horse riding, swimming and dancing.
07:35tanya: when i was younger i did a lot of just normal kids stuff and i had a ball. i rememberbeing little like it was yesterday. 07:53comm: with good looks and an outgoing personality, tanya was always popular. but as she got oldershe started to notice unexpected changes in her body. 08:04tanya: my feet were getting bigger, i was outgrowing my mum’s shirts. i knew somethingwas wrong. 08:13comm: and there was good reason for tanya’s unease. because within a few short years herbody had changed beyond recognition and her
life had turned upside down. 08:23karen: this little girl that was so happy, so beautiful, had changed. 08:35comm: at 18 tanya was 5ft 8 and ten and a half stone. now aged 31, she’s 6ft 8 andweighs nearly 32 stone. and she’s still growing. 08:52tanya: it’s like i woke up one day and i was godzilla or you know, andre the giant. 09:07comm: tanya was diagnosed with acromegaly
at the age of 22. her growth is caused bythe same type of brain tumour that made igor grow massively tall. but unlike igor, tanyacontinues to grow outwards and upwards, which doctors claim is incredibly rare for someonediagnosed with acromegaly post puberty. 09:29karen: tanya doesn’t wear normal shoes. tanya doesn’t wear clothes right off therack. there’s not a standard thing about her. 09:43comm: this is a hugely important week for tanya as she’s due to visit her doctor todiscover whether a new treatment she’s receiving is stopping her growth and potentially savingher life.
09:54tanya: i’ve fought my way this far. i can fight my way even further. 10:09comm: 27 year-old igor vovkovinsky suffers from gigantism and stands at a massive 7ft8. his height means that everyday things that other people take for granted become an issuefor igor. even his transport. 10:24igor: we bought the car almost new off the lot and then we had to drop it off for abouta month at a local chop shop and they had to drop the floors in my car, make them aboutsix inches lower. 10:50comm: while igor’s height means he’s well
known around town, it’s also had a detrimentalaffect on his personal relationships. 10:57igor: my social life has been affected drastically. with my friends i’m no longer able to goand do all the things they do, i usually have to stick to doing indoor things. 11:10igor: hey, can i please get an original bacon-cheese burger combo? 11:16svetlana: his social life is a really difficult issue for igor. he never had many friends.kids of his age they cant understand his problems, what he goes through, how painful for himso he doesn’t have many friends.
11:34comm: because of his size igor’s limbs have to endure excessive weight, making them incrediblypainful. his condition also means that his internal organs grow, putting his heart andlungs under pressure. because of this he has to take daily medication. 11:50dr jakoby: acromegaly has many symptoms. growth hormone excess affects pretty much every organsystem in the body adversely. patients with acromegaly may develop enlargement of theheart and heart failure and also hypertension. 12:05comm: to escape the limitations gigantism has imposed on him, igor often turns to watchingmovies.
12:11igor: i consider myself a little bit of a movie buff… 12:13comm: and he wouldn’t say no to his own 15 minutes of fame. 12:19igor: i’ve thought about going into the movies but the movies haven’t thought aboutme…no-ones ever called me! 12:31comm: tanya angus grew up in henderson, a suburb of las vegas. she considered herselfa ‘normal’ young woman. but gradually she started to notice her body changing andby the age of 22 she’d been diagnosed with
acromegaly. 12:49dr oyesiku: the usual reason people come to attention is because someone, either theirsignificant other or friend, has noticed changes in their facial features. the patient mayhave noticed their shoes get tight, their rings get tight, they just don’t fit anymore.the glove size changes and the facial features become coarse and they just look different. 13:13comm: now 31, tanya has to cope with symptoms such as the lowering of her voice, disfigurementof her face and her continual growth. 13:21tanya: it’s every day i have to deal with
people looking and whispering, look how bigher hands are, look how big she is. it doesn’t feel good. 13:36comm: one of the symptoms of her condition is the continued growth of the hands and feet.as a result tanya’s rings no longer fit her fingers. 13:54comm: today, she’s visiting a local jewellers, who have taken on the task of enlarging herrings. 14:01jeweller: now it took a little time and as you know it’s one of those things we’vegot to go through with these. there’s one…and
there’s two. 14:09karen: wow 14:17tanya: it fits. oh my gosh, oh my gosh, how much was this? 14:27karen: they made this one for you. 14:28jeweller: that one’s a special one from us to you. 14:31tanya: oh my gosh, you made this for me? 14:34jeweller: that’s right.
14:36tanya: oh my gosh, you are the best. 14:41jeweller: hey, i’ll come around to you. we just figured that you had a little roughmonth there so maybe this will remind you to keep shining, alright? 14:51comm: tanya’s enlarged hands, mean that her new rings are twice the size of her oldones. 14:58jeweller: in the history of doing jewellery, which is about 18 years, i’ve never hadto do one this large before. i’ve done professional athletes, including basketball players andwrestlers who don’t have ring fingers that
are this size. 15:11tanya: i do jeweller: you’re so crazy 15:17comm: whilst something as simple as rings may be taken for granted by most, for tanya,they signify so much. 15:24tanya: a girl does want to wear rings, even if she’snot married and i couldn’t wear my rings and nobody would make them that big.karen: it makes me very happy to see tanya wearingrings because so many people in the world
address her as sir and when she has her handsout and they actually see the girly rings they know she’s a girl. 15:53comm: while today has given tanya a massive boost, in less than a week she’ll be visitingher doctor for an appointment that could change her life forever. 16:03karen: whatever it takes we are going to do. 16:10comm: robert wadlow is known as the giant of illinois. born in 1918, he suffered fromgigantism and at a mind boggling 8ft 11 inches is the tallest man in history. and wadlowwas still growing when he died because of
his condition at the age of just 22. 16:41comm: like robert wadlow, igor vovkovinsky suffers from acromegalic gigantism and measuresan incredible 7 feet 8 inches. because of his height igor’s house has had to be speciallymade to accommodate him. 16:58igor: well this house was built specially for me. we had to special order all the doors.they don’t come standard like this and all of our doors are 8 feet high so i don’thave to bend down when i walk in. the rest of the house is custom too. we have cathedralceilings so that i never have to worry about hitting my head.
17:17comm: igor spends a lot of his time playing computer games because they offer him a chanceto escape the limitations of his height. 17:23igor: i can do all these things that i’ll never be able to do in real life, flying,driving fast cars and motorcycles and snowboarding. all those things i can’t possibly do inreal life, i can do on the computers. 17:38comm: whilst being so tall comes with its problems, igor’s height has had its pluspoints. 17:43igor: being tall was a benefit a few times and that was when i used to play basketballwhen i was in grade school, all my team mates
liked the fact that i could get all the reboundsand shoot the basketball. 17:58comm: and his size played an even more pivotal role in 2008 when he met the president ofthe united states. 18:08igor: i wanted to meet barack obama even before he became president, but after he became presidenthe came through the minneapolis target centre. and i met him after waiting in line for about4 hours, waiting in the crowd. it was a pleasure to shake his hand and it was just one of mydreams come true. 18:27comm: and when he met barack obama, igor had a surprise that made him the talk of the town.
18:32i just want to make some special acknowledgments. the biggest obama fan in the country is inthe house. love this guy. 18:43igor: so that was all great. 18:48comm: having undergone brain surgery at the age of 7 igor finally stopped growing whenhe turned 20. but while the surgery saved igor’s life, gigantism continues to affecthim massively, as his body will never shrink, putting pressure on his limbs, joints andinternal organs. 19:05svetlana: nothing in this life will ever be easy for igor and he is really too big tobe comfortable in this life. but i do hope
he will have a happy life. 19:19comm: but despite the difficulties and pain that accompany his condition, igor has finallyaccepted his colossal 7ft 8 inch frame. 19:27igor: if i could choose not to be tall or to be tall, i think i wouldn’t exchangeit because it makes me who i am and it makes me believe the things that i believe. i thinkeverybody was made the made they were made for a reason so i don’t think i want tochange anything. 19:57comm: having been diagnosed with acromegaly aged 22, tanya angus underwent a number ofsurgeries on her brain tumour. but they were
unsuccessful and still she continues to grow.as a result, tanya and her doctors have focussed on trying to find a new drug regime that iscapable of combating her high growth hormone levels. 20:17tanya: there’s about 30 pills here and i have to take each one every day, sometimes2, 3, 4 times a day. 20:28comm: a healthy person’s growth hormone level is between 50 and 250. tanya’s hasbeen as high as 4000 and has never dropped below 1000. 20:39dr jakoby: tanya’s condition is perhaps
more striking because of her duration of illnessand the substantially elevated growth hormone levels which in her case are high even fora patient with acromegaly and that’s because tanya had a very large tumour at initial presentation.and then it didn’t fully respond to attempts at surgery and radiation therapy. 21:04karen: right now, with the growth hormone, with it being high, she deteriorates, herorgans grow, everything grows. 21:13comm: as well as taking a cocktail of pills, tanya has to have daily injections in herstomach to combat her high growth hormone 21:23karen: you ready tanya? 1,2,3. this burns
like a red hot poker. 21:36comm: plus, to combat her growth hormone levels even further once a month she’s injectedwith the maximum permitted dose of a very strong drug. 21:44karen: this medication is like petroleum jelly. it is very, very thick. it comes with a 20gauge needle. to say the least it leaves a very big hole in her skin. this is the difference.the medication is like jelly. 22:12comm: despite this being a traumatic experience for tanya she has agreed to allow us to filmthe procedure, which is performed by her sister
and her mum, a trained nurse. 22:21karen: go ahead. stop. 1, 2, 3. as you see it is bending. ok it’s coming out. 22:31tanya: ow 22:58comm: whilst this is very painful for tanya the fact that her body is under so much pressurebecause of her growth means that she’s in agony every day, especially her back whichis collapsing because of her weight. 23:10tanya: i think i was born to live through pain. you get asked so many times in the hospital-what’s your pain level? how much pain are
you in. you wouldn’t know. you have no idea. 23:32comm: tanya hopes that this drug regime will reduce her growth hormone and stop her growing.but even if that happens, her body will stay the same size. 23:42dr jakoby: unfortunately most of tanya’s pathology is permanent. many of the jointproblems that tanya experiences are permanent. her vertical stature, what we call her acro-growthor her growth with arthritis and osteoporosis and pathologies that limit her mobility areunlikely to improve. 24:02comm: but doctors continue to work to bring
tanya’s growth hormone levels under control.because if they can’t, her future is clouded in uncertainty. 24:11tanya: it doesn’t bother me to talk about dying young. i know i have a very limitedlife span. they said 30, i’m 31. now they’ve said 40, we’ll see. 24:39director: did you want to have children? tanya: i did. i did want to have children.unfortunately i can’t do that. i have so many cysts around my ovaries. and if i gotmarried and that was a big if because i can’t see any man wanting to marry me.
25:33comm: 52 year old mary white lives with her husband ed in the small town of coffee, georgia.mary was recently diagnosed with acromegaly. 25:44dr. oyesiku: mary is a classic case of acromegaly. she has pretty much all the issues. she hasthe changes in physical appearance. the problems with blood sugar control- diabetes. 25:57comm: mary suffers from the same condition as igor and tanya. but because she becameill after she’d been through puberty, meaning her growth plates were closed, mary’s growthis different. instead of growing very tall, she has founds that her face, hands and feethave grown.
26:16mary: my jaw line is growing, my teeth have are separating, my lip, my bottom lip is growing,my nose is a little rounder, my tongue is growing, is actually getting thicker, my voiceis getting deeper. 26:37comm: having been diagnosed two months ago, mary is scheduled to have the tumour thatis causing her growth removed from her brain in two days time. 26:46mary: i feel pretty good about the outcome, the physical outcome. i’m going to be normalor as close to normal as i can get. 26:57director: do you not feel normal at the moment
then mary? 27:00mary: no absolutely not. as a matter of fact one of my doctors actually told me that hecould have passed me on the street and told that i had this disease. so, it kind of putsit all in a different eye for me that people can look at me and see things that are notnormal. 27:26comm: mary and ed will soon be making the five hour journey to a hospital in atlanta. 27:34mary: i’m scared. ed: of course i am nervous. it’s my wifethat’s having the surgery and i plan on
being with my wife for the rest of my life.this surgery could change allot of things either way so yes i’m nervous. 27:56comm: 48 hours time mary will undergo what she hopes will be life changing surgery. 28:17comm: since being diagnosed with acromegaly 9 years ago tanya angus’ life has turnedupside down. today tanya’s travelled into las vegas to pick up something that most peopletake for granted…a pair of shoes. 28:41tanya: oh my gosh, wow. 28:47comm: before she became ill tanya wore a size
8 shoe. but because she’s grown so muchshe now wears a size 15 and it’s impossible for her to find women’s shoes that fit. 28:58comm: as a result she has to wear a pair of men’s sandals…and even they’re incrediblyuncomfortable for her. these shoes have been specially designed and made for tanya by alocal shoemaker. 29:10tanya: i love them. i want to go out. i want to go party. 29:16comm: whilst for most people buying shoes is a simple day to day exercise, tanya’snew pair means so much.
29:23tanya: i love having the shoes. it’s almost like i’m cinderella. 29:32comm: and this is just another small boost that will make a massive difference to herquality of life. 29:38tanya: it feels unbelievable it really does. it’s something i would have never wouldhave imagined. i though that was a part of my past.karen: i’m so happy 29:59comm: later that day tanya and her mum are preparing to spend the afternoon being pamperedas they have their nails done. and for tanya,
it’s important to do things that a normal31 year-old woman would do. 30:15tanya: it’s important because it makes me forget about my tumour and it’s no goodsitting around the house just thinking about it. 30:33comm: because of her size, for tanya something as simple as a manicure / pedicure is an uncommonoccurrence. 30:42tanya: oh my gosh, wow…yeah it feels good, wow. i feel special right now.karen: oh, look how pretty, very pretty. tanya: you like them? i do.
31:10comm: the kind of attention that tanya has received today helps her forget about hermedical problems, at least for a while. 31:17tanya: the size part you never can drop, even when you’re having a good day but it takesthe medical part away, you know, i’m not seeing any doctors today, i’m not dealingwith the injections or anything else you know, it’s just a laugh and have fun day. 31:42comm: forgetting all about her medical problems is great news but in two days time tanya willbe visiting her doctor where she’s hoping for even better news about the fight againsther continuing growth.
karen: this disease could kill tanya. 32:11comm: atlanta, georgia is home to one of america’s most prestigious hospitals. the emory clinic.mary white has recently discovered that she has acromegaly. a condition caused by a tumouron the pituitary gland inside her brain. 32:31mary: those words, brain tumour would just dropyour jaw, that automatically you think your life is over. 32:48comm: whilst not cancerous, this tumour produces an excess of growth hormone, that means partsof mary’s body, such as her lips, skull
and hands have started to grow.men and women are equally likely to be affected by acromegaly and the average age of diagnosisis 42. 32:10mary: i have not felt normal in my life in so long. 33:14comm: having recently been diagnosed at the age of 52, mary is a good example of how acromegalycan affect anyone, at any time. 33:22dr oyesiku: to the best of our knowledge nobody’s protected from developing acromegaly. themajority of patients develop it sporadically, in other words they literally just wake upand they have the condition.
33:34comm: now she’s scheduled to undergo surgery, that will hopefully stop her body’s growthand change her life forever. 33:41mary: for me personally i hope that it gives me some sort of normalcy to my life. the peaceof mind of knowing that the years that would have been taken away from me have been givenback. 33:55comm: dr. nelson oyesiku has performed over 1400 operations on pituitary tumours. butstill there are risks with any operation inside the brain. 34:07dr oyesiku: the risks of surgery in this type
of operation include the risk of infectionand on either side of the pituitary gland lies on artery called the carotid artery,it supplies your brain with blood and if you put your finger on your neck you can feelthe pulse of the carotid artery. and the surgeon operating in this area has to be exceedinglycareful to make sure he doesn’t perturb the carotid artery because of the risk ofbleeding or the risk of stroke. 34:31comm: the carotid artery supplies the brain with blood. disrupting this artery could havecatastrophic consequences. 34:54comm: later that evening, mary is spending her last night before the operation with herhusband ed.
having heard how delicate the procedure is,she’s fully aware of the risks. 34:56mary: i still worry about the things that could go wrong, any time you’re inside somebody’shead and messing about with their brain things could go wrong so it’s only natural to worryabout that. but i’m not going to let it stop me from doing what i know i’ve gotto do. 35:17comm: in a few short hours mary will undergo the operation that she and ed hope will markthe beginning of a new life. 35:36comm: it’s the morning of mary’s operation. the time has finally come for the tumour tobe removed from her brain.
35:43ed: this is very important, i want to be with her forever and with this disease there’sa possibility that she wouldn’t have but a few more years, you know, maybe six andi want our life together to be longer than that. 36:00comm: doctors will remove mary’s tumour through her nose, using a technique calledendonasal transphenoidal neurosurgery. her operation will be carried out by a team ofsurgeons led by dr nelson oyeskiku, who is world renowned in his field. 36:17dr oyesiku:
what we do is we go through the nasal passagesinto the sphenoid sinus which leads you to the back of the pituitary gland. and we dothat using an instrument called an endoscope and an endoscope is a tube that about thatlong and has light going through it and a lens that obviously allows you to see thefield that you’re working in. 36:43comm: as mary’s wheeled into surgery her emotions are running high. 36:47mary: the thought of having the operation scares me, it always has. if i said it didn’ti’d be lying. you try to put on a brave front but you can’t not visualise or thinkabout somebody going up inside your head and
removing something and not be afraid. 37:08comm: mary’s head has to be clamped in place because there’s no room for error. as wellas avoiding damage to the carotid artery the surgeons also have to be very careful withmary’s optic nerve which is situated just millimetres from the pituitary gland and damagingit could leave mary with impaired sight. despite these risks, mary is hopeful that the surgerywill reverse many of her symptoms. 37:34mary: i know i have changed so much, i fought it for so long but i know i’m not the sameperson. but i have hope that i will be. 37:47dr oyesiku: most of the soft tissue changes
we see in patients, once they go into remissionand they stay in remission, you can actually see those reverse. the things that we havethe most problems with reversing are things like bony structure because those are hardand fast if you will. 38:16comm: two hours in and the doctors have located the tumour. it’s now a matter of cuttingthe growth away without leaving any damage – one slip could cause catastrophic results. 38:29dr oyesiku: cotton ball please. second specimen. permanent adenoma. 38:45comm: finally the tumour is removed. with
doctor oyesiku taking extra care to avoidthe carotid artery and optic nerve. 38:58dr oyesiku: that’s a growth hormone, see how white it looks. 39:03comm: the tumour measures about a centimetre across. ironic that something so small canloom so large in someone’s life. 39:13comm: after three hours the procedure is over and the operation has gone well. but it willbe 12 weeks before doctors can carry out tests that will prove conclusively whether they’vebrought mary’s growth hormone levels under control.
39:37dr oyesiku: hi there miss white. 39:39comm: it’s the day after the operation and mary is awake, if a little groggy. dr. oyesikuis visiting her to explain how the operation went. 39:51dr oyesiku: everything went just as planned, we didn’t have any problems what so ever.we found the tumour just like we predicted and we didn’t run into any problems withthe carotid artery or any bleeding so hopefully just a couple of days in the hospital. 40:05comm: while the procedure went well, conclusive
proof of success will be available with theresults from mary’s growth hormone test in 12 weeks time. 40:13dr oyesiku: if those are good then there’s a very good chance that you’ll stay curedfor the long haul. 40:21mary: my whole family, my children, my grandchildren, my husband they want their momma back, theywant their mary back. they want the same person on the outside that they know is on the inside,they haven’t had that in a while. 40:35comm: and for now the future is already looking brighter for mary, as dr. oyesiku is confidentthat the reversal of her physical changes
is already underway. 40:44dr oyesiku: you will notice your features will get softer. actually i can also see alreadythat they’re getting softer. it’s hard to tell for someone who’s not used to seeingit but once you’ve seen the changes in acromegaly it’s not too difficult to even discern verysubtle changes at a very early stage. 41:03mary: i have nothing to do but smile and look forward to the future, i know things are goingto be better, i know they are. 41:14comm: the early signs are that mary’s operation has been a success and she should reap thebenefits.
41:34comm: nine years ago tanya angus underwent exactly the same operation that mary has justhad. but unfortunately doctors were unable to remove all of her tumour, meaning she continuesto grow. tonight, tanya’s putting her medical worries behind her, and hitting the highlightof her home town – the casino! this is a chance for tanya to get away from everythingand just have a good time with her sister and her mum – who plays a huge role in herlife. 42:08tanya: she’s my rock. if i hit the million dollar thing, i would share it with my mum 42:20comm: since being diagnosed aged 22 tanya
has grown over a foot and gained more than21 stone. but her weight gain has nothing to do with her eating habits. 42:30tanya: i have a very small appetite. i never feel like eating. i mean my mom and my sisterhave to remind me. did you eat today? 42:40comm: it’s tanya’s growth hormone that’s responsible for her increased weight and tomorrowshe’s visiting her doctor to get the results of her latest growth hormone test. 42:49karen: if we could get her growth hormone level to be under a thousand her growth wouldslow down substantially. her body would somewhat
adjust and not hopefully be as difficult anda challenge. 43:14comm: later that evening, tanya is preparing to go to bed. one of the symptoms of acromegalyis sleep apnoea because patients’ tongues often grow so large they block their airways,which stops them from breathing. as a result tanya has to sleep with a machine called ac-pap to help her breath at night. as she goes to sleep she’s hoping that the morningbrings some much needed good news. 43:49comm: the following day tanya’s travelled to meet dr. michael jackoby to discover ifher drug regime is slowing her growth. and there’s a lot resting on the consultation.
44:00karen: this disease could kill tanya. 44:10comm: karen is hoping tanya’s growth hormone level drops, as they’ve been informed thatthis would slow her growth considerably and could increase her life expectancy. 44:20karen: we’re praying that it goes lower. if itgoes higher...it will be very bad news. 44:31dr jakoby: good afternoon, good to see you again. i’ve got the results of the resultsof your igf1 testing and i’ve got good news. when i first started seeing you your valueswere constantly over a thousand sometimes
over two thousand. this most recent resultcame back at a little over 600, it was 644. 44:52tanya: oh my gosh. dr jakoby: so i was quite pleased to see thatit had fallen more than two fold so i’m really happy for you and hopefully that willtranslate into you feeling better here in the future. 45:15karen: that’s the best ever. april 25th 2002 it’s never been that low. so that newdrug you introduced her to is working. 45:23dr jakoby: yeas its working quite well. i was really happy to see how well you responded.and the nice thing is i think we have more
room for improvement too. 45:31comm: with the new drug regime seemingly offering hope, tanya’s future is now more positivethan ever before. 45:37karen: this is like the best christmas present we could ever have, because this is the firsttime since tanya’s been diagnosed that it has been under 1000 and that means that theyare gaining control. and we’ve never had control of it. 45:58comm: although still above healthy levels, now that her growth hormone has been reduced,tanya’s growth should decrease. and while
she’ll have to take the drugs for the restof her life her doctors feel that there’s room for even more improvement. 46:12tanya: it’s so unbelievable. it’s great. it makes me feel like i have a brand new leaseon life. i’m going to take those shots regularly. heck if i have to i’ll take them twice amonth. i don’t care about the pain. 46:36comm: like tanya, mary recently received good news. twelve weeks after her surgery she returnedto atlanta for tests. she has now been given the all clear. 46:52comm: igor continues to follow his dream of
becoming a lawyer. although his growth isunder control he has to take medication every day and is still learning to live with thelimitations of his seven foot eight inch frame. 47:10comm: tanya angus has one of the most extreme cases of acromegaly that doctors have everseen. but today’s results offer renewed hope in her battle against this terrible condition. 47:22tanya: i won’t ever give up. i wont ever because a friend of mine told me, anythingis possible.
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