My Dad Saw The Surg. ...

My Dad saw the doctor who preformed his EC operation in October.  He said that things seem to be going well, but since my dad went from weighing 250 to 140 he needs to "eat to survive".  My Dad does eat but has problems with it coming right out of him.  They also did an xray and said the are "no new signs" of cancer.  We were glad to hear that.  I just wish I could ask the doc questions in front of my parents.  I have so many questions, but am afraid to ask the doc in front of them.  I had read that chances of survival are slim for EC cancer patience, with Stage 3 and spread through the lymph node track.  I read it was less then a year.  Any info?? 

 

On 2/15/2008 Need2Know wrote:

My Dad saw the doctor who preformed his EC operation in October.  He said that things seem to be going well, but since my dad went from weighing 250 to 140 he needs to "eat to survive".  My Dad does eat but has problems with it coming right out of him.  They also did an xray and said the are "no new signs" of cancer.  We were glad to hear that.  I just wish I could ask the doc questions in front of my parents.  I have so many questions, but am afraid to ask the doc in front of them.  I had read that chances of survival are slim for EC cancer patience, with Stage 3 and spread through the lymph node track.  I read it was less then a year.  Any info?? 

I needed to ask some questions to my dad's dr. and felt the same as you. I located her email address from the hospital website and emailed her my questions. I told her just what you said; that I had some questions that I didn't want to ask or hear the answer to in front of my parents. She checked with my dad to make sure that she wasn't betraying any confidentiality and then responded. We ended up having a phone conference.

As far as your dad's chances of survival-there are many, many stage III and IV survivors on this site and others. Google EC survivors. If you need the names of some sites, let me know. Just remember that a statistic is just that-a statistic. It doesn't tell you how your dad's body is going to respond to treatment, surgery, etc. Stay positive and try to keep your parents positive as well.

I was going to suggest email also. I use email with my husbands oncologist just because it's often easier. If I think there's something she should know or I have questions, I take care of it. Trying to get through her office staff is a challenge unto itself and this way we both get to address it when we have a free minute instead of in the middle of someone else's care. It works really well for both of us. She doesn't hesitate to call me or ask me to call her if she feels we need to talk about something in more detail.

We are dx in 12/05 with EC and mets to lungs. Still here and have had many good months in between, although there have clearly been bumps in the road. The statistics are bad, but clearly there are more survivors because they are getting better at treating it. Also look at when your statistics are from because you can be looking at old ones and they really have improved in the past few years. And remember someone has to be the statistic that is the survivor. I always think why not us? Yes, the lung mets have reappeared and disappeared a few times, but were gone when we did Ivor-Lewis in 3/06 and have been treatable since, and like I said we've had a lot of good quality time mixed in with the difficult times. Stay positive-it makes all the difference in the world.

Hi,

    I just wanted to say that my mom was diagnosed in Dec 06 wirh stage T3N1M0 EC. She went through 5 1/2 weeks of chemo and radiation. She could not have the surgery. She is currently cancer free as of her last CT. She will have another scan in March. Try not to think about those numbers. Everbody is different. I hope that the Dr's get the eating problems solved so your Dad won't lose anymore weight.

                                                                                   Pat