Hi All,

I've been reading the boards for about a week now. My mom was diagnosed with Stage IV SCC on BOT October 08. She had partial glossectomy and a neck disection on the right side to remove some of the lymph nodes.

Around March 09 the cancer had returned aggressively in her lymph nodes in the same side she had the ND before (I believe it was Stage IV again but not positive). She had another ND and 33 radiation treatments with 3 chemo treatments (beginning/middle/end)over 7 weeks.

She's now about 10 weeks out and she was diagnosed with Stage IV SCC again(has a few visible bumps on her face). We just found out for sure today. Her surgeon mentioned treating it only with Chemotherapy (no surgery), but to talk to her chemo and radiation doctors to see how they would like to proceed.

Her surgeon is at a loss for words, says he has never seen anything like this before (surgeon is from Memorial Sloan Kettering).

Has anyone out there fought an aggressive recurrence with Chemo alone with any success?

We are now considering contacting the Cancer Institute of Philadelphia to see if they have any alternative treatments available in addition to the Chemo. Any advice at all would be greatly appreciated, my mom is way too good of a person to deserve all this.

Josh