Surgery....

On Monday I received a call from the hospital asking me to come in and see a doctor on Tuesday morning. I was just given the doctor's name and outpatient's ward number. A quick scan of the phone directory revealed the outpatients ward focussed on ENT, head & neck problems & plastic surgery. I had been previously told by the orthopedic doctors that a plastic surgeon would be required due to the large size of the tumour. The tumour's resection will leave quite a large hole.

I saw the plastic surgeon doctors on Tuesday morning and, at first glance, it appears that I am in for quite an ordeal. To pack the wound the doctors will have to remove muscle & skin tissue from elsewhere and transplant to my leg. I was told that a muscle will be removed from my back, below the shoulder, along with its blood supply & nerve to be transplanted to my leg. The doctor told me that this should leave me a bit fatigued from time to time in my right arm.

I have to comment that the whole situation is somewhat bewildering. Presently, apart from some swelling in my right thigh and a bit of pain from time to time, I can walk & run ok & generally feel good, though a bit fatigued from the late afternoon onward, due to the aftermath of radiotherapy; in other words less 'gas in the tank'. Though when the fatigue does suddenly occur I do have to lie down to avoid mischief to my body. I also have some respiratory symptoms, possibly as a result of radio therapy.

Overnight I am going to be transformed from a reasonably well person into a partially disabled person, though hopefully most function will eventually return. I have been told that it will take 8 to 10 weeks to recover from surgery.

While all this might seem like an ordeal, surgery will save my leg. In fact this surgical process is called 'limb sparing' surgery. A few years ago when one of my GP's suggested I had a lipoma in the same thigh I carried out an internet search on lipomas, as I didn't have a clue what a lipoma was. Lipomas are benign fatty growths that resemble tumours. On that occasion I read that malignant lipomas resulted in automatic amputation. Lipomas are very similar to liposarcomas.

On Tuesday the radio-oncologist, who previously treated me, was visiting the head & neck clinic in the same ward and had a bit of a talk to me and a couple of med students he had with him, explaining all this too. He later had another talk with both myself and the plastic surgeons explaining the history of the treatment of sarcomas which, until recent years was immediate amputation... thus the term 'limb sparing surgery'.

Surgery is tentatively set down for 6 November, Melbourne Cup day.

In a sense it's a shame that this cancer should develop at this time. When the orthopedic surgeon appeared reticent the other week I carried out Google search on the alternatives and discovered that there have been at least two drugs trialled with varying degress of success on liposarcomas. In one to two years time, automatic resection may be a thing of the past too. I'm still intending to blog a little bit more on liposarcomas & their treatment.
[Edit: Further reading on this subject indicates that while new treatments are being trialled with success, resection still appears to be the primary initial option.]

Cancer is such an obnoxious & insidious disease. That mutating fat cells in my leg show grow into such a large and fast growing blob is incredulous.

One has to be philosophical at this point in time to avoid being overwhelmed by all this. More later.

Cheers

Rob