Anita,

Radiation isn't a must, it is the big gun in the room that can only be fired once...35x or so but you get my meaning. Her tumor was small, originated in the jawbone itself and she didn't have any metastisis.

She had two different types of chemo treatments, before and after surgery, her surgery was done by one of the best surgeons in the country...why have rads? The only reason to is to lessen the chance of a recurrance, but then if you get a recurrance you don't have radiation to help you if it's agressive.

My primary was huge and I had a secondary stage 4 tumor in a local lymph with 2 other hot nodes...after chemo and rads I had responded well to it and was techically cancer free (below malignant levels) and was given the option of surgery...it wasn't mandatory. In fact Dr. Futran called me himself and said, "So it seems you may not need my services after all?"

Of course my ENT intelligently referred my case to the UWMC straight away, my tumor board was held there and Dr. Futran's team set out my treatment plan for my local team to follow. So I'd been using his services all along. But I chose the surgery to repair my jaw, as it was severely damaged and to remove all of the damaged tissue plus lessen the chance of a recurrance...no one could've predicted the facial paralysis that occured due to that surgery.

Sorry...ramble, hope it made sense.

Eric