so many doctors

We had our appointment with Dr. M (oncologist) today.  The point of today's appointment was to go over what we had learned on the phone last week and find out which surgeon we should get our second opinion from (we had already decided we wanted to get a second surgeon opinion).

It was a really good appointment.  Dr. M takes his time, says things in a way that is easy to understand - and just seems like a really nice guy!

He had gotten some feedback from the neurosurgeon that is usually at the Dr. meetings (those Friday meetings with all the Dr.'s where they discuss patient cases).  That neurosurgeon believes that surgery could be done to debulk quite a bit of the tumour with minimal risk.  Dr. M will put in a referral for us - so we are looking forward to meeting him and hearing his opinion.  We asked about who is the 'best' neurosurgeon - but Dr. M gave us the politically correct answer of "they all have to be good to become a neurosurgeon" - I guess that's true though!  We are happy to go with the one that works with Dr. M - he sounds like a middle of the road surgeon (not too aggressive, not too conservative) and obviously works well/communicates well with Dr. M - can't see how that wouldn't work to our advantage.

Dr. M also spoke to Dr. C (the December 17th surgeon).  Dr. C has reviewed the MRI and is still of the opinion of doing no more surgery.  It's confusing - before - Dr. C had informed both us and Dr. M that a good portion of the tumour had been removed.  Now he is saying - he took a modest amount as he didn't want to take any of Stefan's functioning abilities - he instead put in this window (the hole in Stefan's skull) to alleviate pressure.  Which it did.  Our analogy is it's like if you have a leak in your roof - and you put a bucket to catch the water instead of fixing it.  It's frustrating to hear different things from the same surgeon!  While we're thankful that Dr. C did a good job of getting Stefan out of the 'life-threatening' situation on December 17th - we are still confused by his approach.  But - who am I to question a neurosurgeon!

We have an appointment Tuesday with Dr. C.  And hopefully an appointment with the second neurosurgeon soon after!  This is brain surgery - I can understand Dr. C being conservative - but we want a long term view on this.  We will just need to learn all the risks so that we can make the right decision. 

Dr. M went over the before operation MRI as well as the January 27th MRI.  Very interesting to see the pressure on the brain stem pre-operation.  You've all seen the 'window' alleviating the pressure.  Not much was removed from the surgery - that was seen in the MRI's.

Stefan did get some good (although if you asked his mom - she would take it as bad) news that probably made his week/month/year.  Dr. M said he could still play rugby in the future.  Once they get a metal plate on his head where the hole is - it's very possible for him to play again - not anytime soon though!