Susan-We went with the other one also. If we are talking about the same doctor, very young and cute, he is wonderful. He had a great rapport with my husband who was quite the ball buster. It was a little difficult getting straight answers out of him though. Had to push him for the truth. All in all,very competant and I'm glad we found him.

Now...wait...after all the docs I met..not one was young and cute!!! lol

Yeah, young, cute and feisty??? and we have Dr chicken Little so far???

We got the results of the PET from our GP(Dr Chicken little hasn't bothered to let us know yet).

It pretty much confirmed the MRI. It did note a possibility of a small node on the other side which the MRI didn't catch. (although I don't understand how they can say it "didn't cross the midline" if there is a node on the other side now).

But no spread anywhere else. YAY. I can give my over active imagination a rest for a bit.
So, the tests are in and Tues we go to Sloan.

when folks have gone for second opinions(I count this as our first...) do the MDS usually talk to you off the report or do they do their own exam? Just wondering what to expect.

When we went to Sloan my husband was still being treated locally with chemo. We sent all his test results to Sloan ahead of our visit. They gave us their opinion based on them. At that point we were told that they woudn't have done anything different up to that point so we continued with treatment here. When it became obvious that it wasn't working we went back and my husband got on a trial. From then on they took their own tests.

Susan,

Midline is for the tongue. The nodes are a completely different story.

I know my CT of the nodes showed no involvement and my RO blasted them anyway just as if they showed cancer. The doctor at Penn who I got my second opinon from said he would do the same.

On the bright side I only have to shave a small portion of my neck now.

I don't quite get the midline thing but they seem happy about it. I'll take happy where I can get it these days...

I'm not sure if people read about this chef who had tongue cancer. Interestingly, the treatment he really had to look for seems like protocal in many cases now and that was only a few years ago.

There have been several threads about Grant Achatz, the Chicago chef. See here and here and here and here and here.

When I had second opinion at Duke they did there own biopsy and test. Although Baptsit Hospital (a CCC) provided me with all of the tests results, CD's etc. Duke looked at them but wanted tyhier own staff to look at. I was all for it, the more experts that looks at your tests/treatments the better, I think. I also like teaching hospitals for that reason...because I was on a special test protocol sometimes I would have 2 different ENT, Rad Drs look me over on two seperate days plus a few residents. A couple of times someone would see/find an issues and bring up with the others. In my simple way of thinking I was hoping that 6 Drs reviewing my treatments would be less inclined to miss something.

Bill, I like your" simple way of thinking." Makes lots of sense.

Sloan did ask that we get the actual tests(slides, CDs,etc) sent there. Given our lack of confidence in the MD I was relieved about that.

I�m assuming the midline he is referring to is the �line� running down the center of the tongue and through the oral cavity. It is my understanding if you have a tumor on the right side, the threat of spread is greatest through the right side of the lymphatic system (lymph nodes in the right side of your neck). The cancer typically doesn�t �cross the midline� and spread from right to left side, unless you�ve already had radiation. I�ve recently been informed by two different doctors that if you had radiation therapy, this can cause fibrosis which could change the course of lymphatic drainage.