I have to wonder if interviewing him so early in his treatment may do a disservice to the issues at hand by giving the masses the impression that it's no big deal. I would be very interested if they followed up later in treatment or following treatment.

I did great almost up to the end of my treatments and then crashed very hard.

Just a point that most do not know - Michael has been a financial donor to OCF. What you have read so far is accurate, and I would offer this comment on his good cheer and apparent strengths in the Letterman interview.... he is a professional actor. We all know what he is going to be going through, the toll it will take on every aspect of him and his family. But he is certainly already feeling the effects of what is very aggressive treatments.

I turned down ET and the Insider to do TV interviews yesterday and today, but I did do off the record interviews for backgrounder on the disease with the 3 major networks today. I am very close to this situation and feel it is not appropriate for me to comment in public on these shows, speculating on what he has to deal with and the crazy questions some reporters ask, like what do you think his chances are. The media can be such whores, to state it plainly.

There is nothing worse that what our news has turned into - a bunch of has been retired generals, turned into talking heads, second guessing what the commanders on the ground are doing in Afghanistan is a typical example. They don't know the situation, the intel, and are not privy to the big picture, yet there they are on TV telling America how it is, and what should be done. Puke.

Clearly with a diagnosis and a trip right into treatment that is only 3 weeks old, the man and the family are still in shock. That they decided to remain silent for awhile should be no surprise. That hasn't stopped a bunch of doctors starting with Haddad, who commented to People magazine, from speculating on a patient that they know nothing about, when they were not even sure at the time what kind of throat cancer he had, (could have been thyroid, laryngeal, or oropharyngeal all completely different animals right?) to grab a couple of headlines for themselves.

It is inevitable that when a famous person gets our disease, we will get some much needed awareness for oral cancer, a disease that most people have never heard of. But since I am rather close to this situation, I will not be commenting on the Douglas situation here after this post. I know you all wish our fellow traveler on this path well in his battle.

I think there can be difficulties with diagnosis - my husband had no symptoms whatsoever until he found a lump in his neck. The first specialist did an endoscopy but didn't find anything, and the biopsy was false negative. It wasn't until we went to a surgeon specializing in head/neck cancer, who did another biopsy, and then a radical neck dissection, that the base of the tongue tumour was detected. The surgeon found it by sticking his finger down Gordon's throat and poking around while he was under anaesthesia. What the surgeon found was a hard spot at the base of Gordon's tongue and he took a sample for biopsy. The CT scan done later at the Cancer Clinic still showed nothing. The MRI done after that gave a better indication. All I'm trying to say is that this kind of cancer seems to be easily missed and hard to detect. Sometimes I think it's just the luck of the draw - having the right Dr. at the right time - that it's caught.
Anne

Well my opinion of MD just went up after reading Brian's post. I had no idea he donated to OCF and thus indirectly helps keep this forum going. Just another reason to wish him well in the grueling weeks ahead. Brian's point about MD being a professional actor is well taken. MD even alluded to it in the video when he told DL the reason he looks so good is
"I'm on stage".
Charm

I think that the statement "Practice of Medicine" sort makes a clear statment that medicine is an art as much as a science.
Since Oral cancer is not a cancer which is found in a high precentage of the population doctors are not going to think about it first, like they would a lump in the breast. Also there are many things that may intitally mimic the same symptoms of cancer. So they would naturally treat those first. My Oral Surgeon told me that the spot was nothing to worry about but let's just do a biopsy to be sure.Once the diagnois came back told me in 27 years of removing spots from people's mouths he had NEVER gotten this diagnois. I was just lucky because of the location and of course my daily "PET" pushed me to take action.

I want to wish michael all the best just knew it when i saw the water bottle.

I wish MD the best. I know the road ahead of him and his family. I was there as a caregiver to my husband 10 years ago he had Stage 4 throat cancer. Back then they didn't have the technology they have now and all the meds, I wish they did.

Stay strong Michael and his family.

I would like to add my best wishes to MD and his family in the difficult days to come. I hope they find comfort in each other and in knowing how much we care and want the very best outcome for him in beating this cruel disease. I can�t help but feel that he has every chance of success.

Its hard for everyone to get oral cancer.If you are such a well known person, like MD, its even a bit harder. Why? because you cant keep it a secret. Because cancer is a personal issue, something that really involves those close to you,not the masses or the media. Yet he was gutsy enough to go out there and yes, played a little charade about whats going on with Letterman. But the reality is, Stage IV tongue cancer is extremely dangerous, specially after knowing his tumor is about the size of a nugget. Also, the spread to his limph nodes was not disclosed, and thats also a key factor. My very best wishes to him and his family.

It's never easy hearing about someone being diagnosed with cancer, and to hear about another being dx'd with OC is an extra blow to the gut because "we" know what's coming throughout the tx process. You can tell in parts of the MD/DL interview that at times MD was nervous even though he was "on stage" as a professional. During the interview I also wondered to myself how it all seemed to eerily familiar not knowing that it was BOT/node involvement. And as Charm did, I also questioned the 80%, my survival rate was in the 30% range. But as always, today is better then yesterday and my yesterday was over 2 years ago--so I'm sure MD's BOT, stage IVa, node(s)?, HPV related? OC has better numbers. I wish MD and his family the best...What better person to have in your corner then Brian Hill? Nobody.