Hi Gary, Hi Marica,

I am having my treatment thru the national health.

On the subject of " To radiate or not to radiate" there seems to be a change in attitude over here regarding surgery/chemo/radio. The recent norm was to do a belt and braces job i.e. surgery follwed by radio or chemo or all three. however, because oral cancer SCC has a high reoccurence rate the feeling is now that there has to be a bullet kept back.

in my case i was told i would be having quite major surgery ( 11 hours) and there is no way they would attempt any other treatment for some time but then i would be having radio therapy for approx 4 to 6 weeks. the number of sessions wasn't mentioned at that time.

I was discharged from the hospital one week after surgery and on the day of discharge the consultant told me i might not be having radiotherapy if the pathologist confirmed his opinion.

He then told me i wouldnt be having r/therapy as the tumour on the floor of mouth was removed with a large clear margin and the only positive node that they could find out of 34 nodes removed contained only single encapsulated cells, this had been confirmed in pathology.

This then, he said, gives the radiographer nothing to aim at. He also said that the opinion at the hospital is that sometimes radiotherapy causes more problems than it solves, especially when , as in my case part of the tongue is involved.

At this moment my speech isnt right but i can be understood if I speak slowly, i can drink but cannot eat solids (still feeding thru peg), my consultant believes that both of those could be affected using radiotherapy.

Also If i were to have radiotherapy now then it would be a long time till i could have it again if it was subsequently needed through reoccurence, if on the other hand it is not given now then it is another string to the bow.

Also r/therapy in the oral cavity rules out any surgery in the near future on that site if it was needed. there is only so much even a healthy body can take.

I have in no way tried to influence their decision on further therapy but i can see the sense in not trying to fix something that is not evidently broken.

Anyways, thank you both for your comments and kind welcome. by the way Marica Liverpool football club could only manage a draw today but if thats all i have to worry about, ah well.

Good luck to you

and kindest regards

Paul