More Chemotherapy Planned to Combat Mantle’s Cancer

Mickey Mantle prepared for more chemotherapy today to slow an aggressive cancer that has spread in his abdomen, and a doctor said the disease also may be in his bowel.

“They think there is a tumor in the bowel. They have some reason to think so,” said Dr. Isaac Djerassi, a cancer specialist who met with Mantle’s doctors last week. “There is something there--it’s only a shadow” on the CT scan.

Doctors for the 63-year-old Hall of Famer have refused to discuss specifics of his illness.

The former New York Yankee slugger is at Baylor University Medical Center where he is suffering from hepatoma, an aggressive form of cancer. He was listed in serious condition Thursday.

Hospital spokeswoman Denise Kile Walton would only confirm that the cancer had spread in Mantle’s abdomen, refusing to identify specific organs.

Doctors plan to start a different type of chemotherapy today, said Roy True, an attorney who has known Mantle since 1969.

Dr. Brian Carr of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Transplant Institute said most patients in Mantle’s condition do not live beyond 18 months, at best.

Djerassi said that while Mantle cannot be cured, there is a chance that the disease could go into remission from the chemotherapy.