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Cancer Diary: What Doctors Say and Said, and What I Needed Them to Say and Wish They Had

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  The final conversation had with Carl's oncologist was what we needed in our first conversation but did not get. Not quite two weeks before Carl died, at which time he was in a subacute facility, having fallen the week before, been admitted to the hospital, then shifted to the care facility, the oncologist called us with the results of the latest scans. "Not good at all," he said, and he gave us three options: let nature take its course -- Carl could move to in-hospital hospice or in-home hospice (we chose the latter, and while we had a very bad experience with the initial hospice , it was still the best choice) try out another chemical compound - He told us he had given us the most appropriate and strongest ("the best") that he had, but if we wanted to try another mixture, he would look at other options take part in a clinical trial - He did not of any for Cancer of Unknown Primary and would have to do some research; there might not be any, and there might no...

Sula and Cancer: A Personal Matter

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Sula, Parish Cat at Old Mission and well known author to readers of this blog, has suffered from cancer for many years bow. Her first book, Surviving Cancer, Healing People: One Cat's Story , was meant to provide hope and understanding to people suffering from cancer. From the input received at the publishing office, that goal is being reached on a regular basis. Sula's skin cancer returned, as detailed in the book, and her ears were removed. After that, she has been free of skin cancer.  However, another cancer appeared. This one was at the injection site for one of her inoculations. It resulted in a cyst, which Sula's vet removed. However, with time, the tumor returned about a year ago. Her vet recommended amputation of her leg and estimated that her remaining life would be about six months if the cancer were not treated. The parish priest did not want to go to extremes like amputation and decided that it would be best to let Sula live out a normal life even if it would ...