Bill & Pat Boulch

Dr. Scott Stone (Yes that’s his real name) the Oncologist that works with Dads Pulmonologist (Lung Guy) came by this morning with the final lab results on the two tumors that were removed on Wednesday.

We Got The News We Were Hoping for!

If you absolutely must have a big scary cancer, there are certain things you pray for…

In Dads case short of the tumors being benign, the best case scenario is that:

1. We caught the malignant tumors early…We did! (best guess is that they are less than 6 months old.)
2. That they could be surgically removed with clean margins…and they were! (according to the initial frozen sections)
3. That the cancer has not spread beyond the contained (and now removed) tumors… it hasn’t! (The surgeon who found the second small pea sized tumor looked far and wide including all the lymph nodes over under top and bottom and couldn’t find any other evidence of any tumors or abnormal tissue beyond the two that were removed. Also the prior biopsy of the upper chest lymph nodes from two weeks ago came back negative on both the frozen and pathology results.)
4. And finally that the cancer that was found in the lungs, DID NOT come from some other part of the body! It was always the opinion of the Pulmonologist as well as his oncologist that this started recently and started in the lungs. Now the final pathology is in and we have confirmed that this did start in the lungs!

If they had only found one tumor, the one in the lower right lobe of the lung, they would have removed the lower third of Dads lung as a precaution, and probably to be safe, do a round of Chemo to be absolutely sure.

Because the surgeon found the second pea sized tumor on a second lobe, they made the decision not to remove any of the lung (other than the tumors and wide margins around them) As Chemotherapy was now mandatory.

So in the end the prognosis is very good!

Dad didn’t loose any of his lung, and… now confirmed by the lab results, the cancer did not come from somewhere else in the body (The Pet Scan confirms this as well)

Dad got a good night sleep last night now that all the tubes and painful lung drain have been removed and the doctor has cleared him to go home as soon as he feels ready…probably tomorrow (Sunday)

Going forward Dad will take a round of Chemo to clean up any cancer cells still floating around in the lung and greatly reduce the chance that cancer will return down the road.

Here’s where you realize everything happens for a reason…

One of the many tubes that got removed yesterday was the oxygen supply in his nose, the respiratory therapist said he no longer needed oxygen. That was around noon!

At five o’clock they came in to take Dads vital signs and his Oxygen level had plummeted to 60%!

There was a small panic and they called in the head of Respiratory therapy and he started shaking his head… something was wrong here… Dad’s color was good and he was breathing normally and Not out of breath and… Not passed out!

At 60% a normal person would be blue and out like a light… Hummmm… they tried the oximitor on various fingers and toes and couldn’t get a normal oxygen reading… The Respiratory therapist said… wait a second Ill be right back…

He came back with a different kind of meter, stuck it on Dads forehead and guess what? His Oxygen was normal, 98%!

In fact his oxygen is and as it turns out always been normal, always including the days following his Knee operation….

But! Because it reads low on a normal oxygen monitor, they brought in Dr. Long the Pulmonologist after the knee operation, and that lead to an x-ray, that led to a Cat scan that showed the cancer!

It was all one big accident… Or Was It?

Had Dad decided not to have the knee replaced, or if he had the operation when he originally wanted it about 9 months prior… (delayed by a vein stripping, then a spider bite that wouldn’t heal and finally the flu that delayed the knee operation the final time) or had the normal oxygen meters worked correctly on him after the knee replacement, or had Dr. Long not taken the extra step to do the Cat scan… we would have never found the cancer!

Many of you know that a bad case of heartburn that felt like a heart attack, caused by Grandma Boulch’s famous spaghetti recipe sent Dad to the emergency room where they found no heart problems but “accidentally” ended up finding and surgically removing a 98% blockage in his carotid artery!

Thanks Grandma!

While Dad will tell you that fixing these happy little accidents “Sucks” God is gently and obviously leading Dad right were he wants him and keeping him safe from catastrophic illness!

Prayers and well wishes for Dads final treatment and well tolerated chemo can be sent to the contact information above.

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