Mother - Tumor Removed

papersau

Hi

I posted just over a week ago regarding my mother. She is a non-smoker, and a 2.5cm nodule was found in her upper right lobe in January. She opted to have the entire lobe removed through conventional methods, rather than VATS. She had the surgery last Wed and is still in the hospital recovering. She seems to be doing well, but she did have a small air leak...so she is still draining into a tube and has an epidural in for morphine.

The surgeon met with her today to discuss her pathology results. The nodule was malignant...he believes non-small cell. All of the surrounding lymph nodes were clear and removed in the surgery. However, he says the tumor was very close to the lining of the lung and that it was a bit puckered....so he is still recommending 3 mos of chemo...every three weeks. It's her decision, but it does appear the surgery was fairly successful in removing the apparent cancer cells.

Any thoughts on taking chemo from anyone? Your comments/ suggestions are apprecated.

Thanks

CHG

I had an upper right lobectomy in July '05. I had 6 weeks of daily radiation and weekly chemo before surgery and two sessions of chemo after surgery to kill any unseen or microscopic cancer cells. To date my follow up scans have all been clear. Long story short. I am vey glad that I had the chemo after surgery.

Plymouthean

Hi. Glad to hear that your mother's surgery went well. I had the upper lobe of my right lung removed, and I had follow-up chemo and radiation, which were started approximately two months post surgery. The radiation consisted of ten treatments, and the chemo consisted of twelve , once-a week IV treatments with Taxol and Carboplatin. I had NO side effects whatsoever from these treatments. I definitely feel that the post surgery chemo and radiation are a good insurance policy against any "bad guys" that might have been left behind in the body. Best wishes to your mother for a speedy and complete recovery.

scungileen

DO the chemo. My dad had a lobectomy in February, 2004. They took 19 lymph nodes and all came back clean. Chemo was not recommeded. They felt it was contained and they got it all. Last April my dad showed signs of elevated blood counts (cancer is somewhere). It finally showed up after 9 months of repeated pet scans. This January (23 months from his last bout) he was diagnosed with a malignant pleural effusion - Stage IIB nsclc. We don't know if the two lung cancers are related, being they are in different areas, but we'll always guess. We now wish we had insisted that he had chemo. Be safe rather than sorry.