Prognosis

We don't have any changes to Dad's prognosis as yet.  He gets a couple more treatments before they will scan him and see what affect the treatments have had in shrinking his tumors.

We recently stopped into his Drs office for an appointment that they scheduled.  Doc comes in the room, greets us and says "Why are you here today?"  Ummmmmm cause you said to be here.  UGH!  There was no reason for us to be there.  But Dad and ESM did have some questions to be answered.  Change that, answered by the Dr and translated by me.  sigh.....

Anyway, Doc said that there is considerable liver involvement, which I wasn't aware of before this appointment.  I knew there were some lesions on the liver but didn't realize how large they were. And then there are the tumors in his stomach.

ESM asked for a prognosis from this Doc.  He said we would have to wait until after the scan, which they would do after the next two treatments.  ESM wasn't happy with that answer.  I tried to explain to her, tried to reassure her that everything was fine.  She said she was ok when we left the Drs office.  I could tell she wasn't and it bothered me. I didn't want her to be anymore worried than she already was, I wanted to find a way to explain things to her.  BUT I didn't want to talk about this in front of Daddy, in case ESM wanted to talk about a death sentence for Daddy.

I wanted to explain to ESM that with the information they had on Daddy from his scans and tests, they really couldn't make a prognosis.  Or if they did make a prognosis, it wouldn't be a good one considering how much disease involvement there is.  I wanted to explain to ESM that because they offered treatment that they have hope that they can do something for Daddy, even with all the disease involvement.  I wanted to explain to ESM that once they finished the cycle of treatment and scanned Daddy, they would be able to determine if the treatment was working and would be able to come up with a prognosis based on the success of the treatment.  I wanted to explain to ESM that once they determine the success or failure of the treatment, they would come up with another treatment plan, be it continuing with this one or talking about hospice and comfort.

BUT there was no way I wanted to talk about this in front of Daddy.  I don't know if he wants to know a prognosis or if he already knows that they can't/won't make a prognosis just yet.

 

ESM and I ran into town the other night and I had my chance to chat with her about how things work in the medical community.  When we were done talking I felt better about how she felt.  And I hope she shares with Dad if he's concerned.

 

Until we get a new scan, things are status quo.