My mom was diagnosed with stage 4 throat cancer a few months ago and has undergone chemo and is now doing the radiation which is very hard on her the doctors are also talking about doing a neck dissection. Can somebody please help me understand what exactly that is?

thanks

stacey
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Staceyjo, that means removing lymph nodes from the neck. There are radical and modified dissections. I recently had 20 nodes removed in a modified version. There was a very minimum of pain and discomfort, and the swelling, while great at first, rapidly diminished. If your mother's doctors recommend this procedure, I would recommend that she agree and not be afraid. Keep checking back, because there are many people on this forum who are much more knowledgeable than I am, who will surely provide you with more than this very basic information. Good luck to you and your mom!
Joanna

Stacy,

Do a general search on the web for neck dissection. There are some really infomative sites. You have to remember that there are several types, radical and modified. I had one in conjunction with the removal of a maligant tumor on the base of my mouth. The skin removed from my neck was used to help rebuild the bottom of my mouth. They also removed all of the lymph nodes from both sides of my neck during the procedure.

Please ask the doctor a lot of questions, so you have no surprises in the end.

Anne.

My mother had the modified radical neck and a feeding tube in her stomach installed on the same day. She was 78 at the time and was only in the hospital for one night. Unfortunately that was followed a few weeks later by 8 weeks of chemo/radiation. The surgery was the easy part...radiation is what really tore her up.
But she came through that as well and after even more surgery a month in the hospital this time she is at home and doing pretty well considering the last year. She lives alone and gets along fairly well.