meeting with dr ryu this morning, he felt it was time to start looking toward next steps (ie after hospital discharge). hes going to schedule a visit with a radiation oncologist, but as seems to be my pattern, im still in a “gray area.”
on the one hand, the tumor removed was 2.5 cm across – an inch-wide ball of cancer inside my tongue explains a lot about how much discomfort i was experiencing prior to the surgery. with that size, radiation is viewed as mandatory.
but on the other hand, full biopsy of all removed tissue (tongue and neck lymphs) still reveals zero metastasis, which is quite rare in stage three oral cancers.
so we have to decide how aggressive to be with the radiation.
Those decisions are so hard to make.