Success of radiation only without any surgery after 2-3 years?

Well, Star as a medical professional I would imagine you have seen a good many of these cases, maybe not close up but have a buildup of knowledge because of it.

If I am reading your answer correctly it looks like you are fairly certain you will be getting surgery after the radiation. You can correct me if I'm wrong. You said "I believe that the only reason they do radiotherapy is because Medicare and insurance require it before surgical intervention." And your follow-up to that was do surgery before radiation because it is not scarred or affected by radiation thus healing better. Which I wholeheartedly agree. I have never heard of the ruling that for medicare to pay you need to have radiation first. Usually, in cases on here people have surgery to remove cancer and then radiation and or chemotherapy or both to mop up any cancer that couldn't be removed and also errant cancer cells. Many cases these days of head and neck cancer are handled with radiation and chemotherapy combo alone instead of surgery if possible because of the disfigurement that many times occurs and has been that way for some time. I had the radiation and chemotherapy route for my first cancer back in 2012/2013 of throat cancer. So I assume you are on Medicare? My opinion would be if I was going to have surgery I definitely would want the surgery before anything else. If you are getting surgery the follow-up is to make sure the small stuff is cleared out. Or else not have surgery and go the other route. I will say again if someone was getting surgery it was always the first step or sometimes it is used as the only step because the surgeon feels they can remove the cancer and have clear margins negating the need for any follow-up treatment. It would be worth it to pay a little more if you can afford it and get the surgery first. I was on medicare in Sept. of 2019 and had lymph node surgery of the neck area and then had follow-up radiation to mop up and had no problems.

Anyway, I am getting long here and I may not fully understand your situation I admit but I see you have a professional medical care team and the only option you were given was radiotherapy, premiere treatment at a major hospital all looks good. Confidence in your care team had a ? followed by uncertain. You are having treatment in an extremely vital area and it can have long-term implications, so I would recommend if you are not comfortable with your situation enough you may want to get a different opinion and maybe even at a different hospital in your area, or if you can travel to a major cancer center or hospital which for many of us is difficult or out of the question.

I hope I have given something helpful here and if I have something wrong please feel free to correct me.

Wishing You the Best

Take care, God Bless-Russ

Mr. Zilla glad your treatment is underway and things are going well so far. It al;so sounds like you are surrounded by a good medical team. That's important.

Take Care God Bless-Russ

First, I am sorry that you are going through this and facing decisions that will have long term impacts.

You asked whether anyone had radiation without surgery. I am one person that didn’t have surgery

I had radiation treatment/chemo for t3n1m0 squamous cell carcinoma located on my tonsil. That was 2 years ago. Where my tumor was located, it would have been difficult to have surgery. I had multiple surgeons tell me it wasn’t operable. For the radiation treatment, I had proton therapy. 70gy to tumor area and 30 to nonclinical areas from cheekbone to collarbone. My recent mri was clear and I also had the blood dna test that was clear. Not sure if you count that as ‘cured’, but radiation kills cancer cells.

Depending on your situation, docs will suggest what they think will work. Different institutions may have different preferences.

Any treatment will have its cost. I picked proton therapy because I wanted radiation to be more targeted. I was worried about the effects of treatment and did not want IMRT.

Some docs are doing descalated radiation doses for early stages cancers such as you described.

Darcy, I am so glad for you and your husband what a wonderful success story.

I am thankful you added your story in. it is always a Blessing to hear from cases like your husbands who are NED, and cancer free because it gives others so much hope and it is wonderful to share in the joy of a success story like yours Darcy.

I stated earlier to Startoker that surgery is usually the first option with radiation cleanup afterward. Well, looking at your husband's case I forgot that sometimes they keep surgery as a backup. I guess there are a number of ways to approach a cancer situation involving surgery, rads, and chemo, and also immunotherapy.

So I would like to state I was WRONG and stand corrected.

I try to do my best on here and give people solid information but I do really goof up sometimes.

Startoker-My Apologies.

consider yourself lucky that you dont have to deal with the side effects of chemo or surgery. You must be very lucky it was caught early. Don't worry, the radiation treatment will give you more than you ever thought you would ever have to live thru!

It looks like Dr's are taking a less aggressive look at treating some cancers, like hpv+ scc tonsil C instead of going crazy, Dr's have backed off quite a bit from earlier treatments for less long term side effects.