John found a mass in his right forearm in January of 2009. After
consulting a local physician about it, he was referred to a local
hospital for more testing. After further review it appeared to resemble
a soft tissue sarcoma. Due to the rarity of that form of cancer, the
doctors here did not feel comfortable treating him for it. So they were
going to send him to a bigger hospital in our region. We researched
sarcoma ourselves and came to realize how rare it really was. After
discovering that, we didn't even feel comfortable going to the regional
hospital for consultation and treatment. We felt like it would be
better to go somewhere that had a lot of experience with this type of
cancer. It was then that we realized how much experience MD Anderson
Cancer Center had with sarcoma, and that they even had an entire sarcoma
unit. The decision was made and we were off to Texas for a biopsy.
After the biopsy, the doctors seemed fairly certain that it was a
sarcoma, but it would take surgery to remove the tumor at this point to
find out for sure. We returned 2 months later for surgery to remove the
tumor. At that point, the doctors still felt it might be a type of
tumor they had never seen before, but since they couldn't determine
exactly what it was, they strongly encouraged us to treat it like a
sarcoma. That meant that we would need to return to Texas a month later
for 7 weeks of radiation treatment on his arm to be sure and remove any
trace of cancer that could be remaining. We packed up our 3 small
children and relocated to Houston for 2 months while undergoing
treatment. After that time, he was given clearance to return home and
life as normal with regular checkups every 6 months. Three years later,
he now just goes once a year and will return to Houston at the end of
the month for his next checkup! It's given us such peace of mind to
know that we did everything we could to get him the best treatment
possible with doctor's that are so knowledgeable about such a specific
type of cancer.
If you would like to make a donation to John's Team - 9th Floor - please
click here.
