Update from Visit with Oncologist

Thursday we did meet with our local oncologist to report on our meeting with the specialist at the University of Pennsylvania.

It was really rather uneventful. But, when you've had as much experience with the health care system as I've had, you know that doctor's offices do not always communicate, strong interactions between offices cannot be relied upon. You HAVE to take charge.

And true to form, the specialist in Philly did not report to my local oncologist, or any other doctor. So we became the communicators.

We could have told him anything.

We chose to tell him the truth of course.

He didn't seem thrilled that I cut my chemotherapy daily dose in half without his blessing. I understand. It appears to minimize his significance. But I did it with the blessing of the specialist. And we certainly didn't mean to minimize his importance in the grand scheme of things. Actually we count on him very much.

Our experience with working with the offices in Philadelphia are kind of like a reflection of Philadelphia itself - chaotic, unfriendly, intimidating and confusing. In contrast, Lancaster may not be quite as advanced in its tools and methods, but they are far more organized, courteous and easy to work with. My hat's off to the doctors and nurses at Lancaster General Hospital's Cancer Center. They have tough things to deal with and do it with grace, respect and kindness.

Basically our local oncologist signed on with the current gameplan. Now it's just a matter of executing.

We did learn that no one locally is doing the ablation procedure, which we hope to pursue. Ablation, apparently, uses a CT scan to guide a big, long needle directly into a tumor, and then freezes it or burns it with radio waves. The word through the cancer community is that this procedure is working very well, killing tumors without causing so much damage to surrounding healthy cells.

So we'll be heading back to West Philly, just outside Center City, to meet with a surgeon to consult on the procedure. Then we'll be back in Philly for the out-patient procedure. And I'm guessing this will include one more trip to Philly for a follow-up exam.

I'm going to continue half doses of chemo until a week or two before the ablation procedure. I'll have to come off the chemo completely then. The chemo can increase risk of bleeding and it certainly slows healing. So . . .

But after all of that, hoping all goes well, I'll be back on full chemo doses and continue to be aggressive in attacking this thing.

We did have to wait about an hour to see the doctor Thursday. But when you find out he needed to give a lung cancer diagnosis, with significant spreading, to a family of five with many, many questions . . . well . . . we understand.