Really only a few? The doc told us like it was the way they always did it. Maybe there was something about Harry? I never really asked although like I said, it has been my experience that the docs tailor make each tx which is why I said that in my last post.

When Harry was in the hospital they would record how much fluids he got through his IV and they made him track how much by mouth and every time he went to the bathroom he had to measure that too. Maybe it was because of his age? He also had 4 infusions rather than the 3 I hear a lot of others get. I am sure that his docs had their reasons and we trust them completely. They haven't let us down yet.

His MO is the Chief of Hemotology and Oncology at Baylor, his RO is the Chief of Radiation at Baylor, and his ENT trains most of the ENT's in the medical center here in Houston. We have always felt very lucky that we got the best of the best. This is why I said that you MUST choose your docs carefully and when you feel you have chosen well then you just have to trust them.

Thanks for your input Gary. You have to be one of the most knowledable people when it comes to the technical parts of treatments and I have relied on your advice numerous times.

Thanks for being here!
Cindy

I'll have to ask my MO when I see him in 2 weeks what his experience is, but my experience on the forum has been maybe 1/2 dozen or less were hosptalized for infusion. I probably should have been. I have Hep C and got so violently ill from the treatment that they shortened it by 1. I'll be 59 in 2 weeks and 55 when I started the adventure.

Maybe that's their protocol at their institution - I just spoke with the oncology nurse and they hospitalize very few for infusion, in fact, mostly those with a peritoneal drip for cervical cancer specifically. The center I go to is in a densely populated area (7 million in the greater bay area) and go through the infusion center like cattle. They would have to build a whole new wing to house all of the infusion patients.

Cisplatin is typically coordinated with radiation, hence the 3 week intervals. I had 33 rad treatment, maybe 37 makes a difference in the Cisplatin schedule.

They also give Cisplatin as a stand alone treatment occasionally, but not typically for H&N cancer.

Thanks for the info. I guess all this time I just assumed it was not unusual but now I am thinking that there are some questions I ought to be askin' the docs.

A strange thing was that the last day he was in the hospital as we were leaving for the last time, one of the residents pulled me on the side. She told me that one of the reasons they didn't do surgery is because the tumor was so close to some artery or something like that which meant that surgery was very dangerous. I have never been able to understand why she told me that since none of his doctors ever mentioned anything like that.

I did notice from talking to the people at rad that he had rad tx's for almost twice as many minutes as many of the other patients. It came up several times because of the scheduling issue. I always wondered about that as well. He had a blue cross at the bottom of his throat where the collar bones come together. Right were the little dip is in the top part of the chest just below the neck. The Rad techs told me it was a secondary tx area so the txs were in 2 parts everyday. One that covered the neck and jaw area and one that covered the area where the cross was. It was the only mark they had to put on him as the other marks were on the mask.

Anyway, thanks for your insight. It is always helpful.

Cindy