It is the evening of October 15th, day 21, and I sit in my office looking at the pictures on the wall, looking out my office window into the dark sky. My thoughts are clouded by the events of today. My father only has 6 to maybe 8 months left. I don't want to focus on the numbers, but it is all my mind keeps playing around in my mind. I continue to think if there...
"I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference." ~Robert Frost My father sits at the head of my parents round oak table. I sit to my fathers left, my mother sits to his right. My father begins by stating that he is not going to take the more aggressive chemotherapy, the 5FU. "I don't...
Saturday October 12th my father was finally scheduled for his long awaited PET scan. My parents and I arrived at the hospital at 7am. Within less than five minutes someone cam back to explain the scan to my father and escort him back to the scanner. As soon as my father was out of sight, I turned and asked my mother how she was doing. She just looked at my and begin to weep. I leaned...
Since the mid 1990’s, delays in patients beginning treatment for cancer care have been increasing. As the population of the U.S. continues, more people will continue to be diagnosed with cancer, and as new therapies continue to extend survival rates, the demand for health services focusing on cancer will continue to increase and stress the healthcare system. In the below chart you can see how the time it takes from a patient having a biopsy, being...
So the morning came and by about 10am I was done waiting to hear from my mother and I called her for an update. She had informed me that as of that moment, no one had called her or my father back. I encouraged her to call both the primary care physicians office as well as the GI surgeon. She had to leave messages. About an hour later, the nurse for the GI surgeon gave my...