Tim,

All I can tell you is that the decision was made for my husband Rad and chemo before any surgery.

He has completed all treatments and we are now waiting to do his scans but the lymph nodes (he had 2) are no longer palpable and the tumor on the base of his tongue can no longer be seen by the ENT. (He could see it prior to treatment).

He is stage III and this was the recommended treatment to begin with. We were also told that the results were as good or better when the txs are done before any surgery.

My husbands ENT is a Baylor doc and his medical oncologist is the Cheif of Hematology and Oncology for Baylor. His rad doc is the cheif of radiology for Baylor. The three of them agreed that the txs were best first before any cutting.

Now please keep in mind that the team makes its recommendations based on each patient so it is hard to say that this is the right path for you. But if it were me and I had 2 docs saying the same thing and one saying something different and given the fact that the one being different is advocating using a knife.... I personally would go with the non-slicing docs. Just my personal opinion.

I have had conversations with all of the docs and the ENT in particular about the possibility that the tumor is still there but just shrank. He said that that would make it easier to remove if need be. I guess that the smaller the tumor the less they would have to remove???

I am sorry that I cannot give you a black and white answer but as I am sure you have already discovered this is not a black and white disease.

Ultimately, the decision you make will be the one that you feel most comfortable with.

I wish you much luck and good thoughts.

Cindy