The Oncologist

I was due to meet the Oncologist to discuss the results of my MRI scan. We waited uncomfortably. Then a letter came giving me an appointment, but it was cancelled the day before by telephone. A couple of days later another letter arrived. It called me in to the Chemotherapy Suite for an assessment.

Anxiety surged through me. I looked up tumours in the liver and found that the usual treatment was either surgery or ablation. Oh no, I thought, this means my tumour wasn’t treatable in the normal way. Then I looked up chemotherapy for Renal Cell Carcinoma and found that the drugs they currently had didn’t eradicate it, they only slowed down the tumour’s progress. I felt very depressed.

I tried to keep myself busy and went on long cycle rides, so that when night came I was very tired and slept. After all I didn’t feel unwell. If the routine scan hadn’t found a problem I wouldn’t have known anything about it. One of the rides I did was up to Spelga Dam via the highest road in NI at 1350 feet. It was a real struggle but I managed it. I was delighted; I hadn’t done that steep climb since before I had cancer. I suppose I was also trying to challenge myself to prove that I was really alright. 

I hadn’t been to the Chemotherapy Suite before. It was a large comfortable waiting room with easy chairs, magazines, free tea and coffee. You were given a bleeper and when this went off you had to head down one of three corridors to the treatment rooms where the heavy business took place. We sat and waited in this ante-chamber along with many others. A good number were pale and gaunt: some in wheelchairs, some with no hair. I was very afraid that I would soon be joining them.

Finally we were called. At the end of the corridor a room and a different Oncologist to the one I’d seen before. She said the lump in my liver was confirmed as a tumour. It was small, 1.8 cm in diameter. I nodded, my pulse was beating faster. She told me that my case had been discussed at a multi-disciplinary team meeting and the recommendation was that I should have surgery. I gulped. She said that I would shortly be called to the Mater Hospital to meet the surgeon.

‘And what about chemotherapy?’ I said, hesitantly.

‘We wouldn’t be recommending that’, she said.

‘But your letter said I should come here for an assessment,’ I said, showing her the letter.

‘We were really worried,’ said T.

‘It’s just words on a page,’ said the Oncologist dismissively. ‘Surgery is the first treatment option and you’ll soon be called in to the Mater.’

We walked out of the Chemotherapy Suite with a spring in our step. The letter was, of course, only words on a page. But which words were placed on the page did matter. I imagine the problem was caused by a mistake or laziness in the office. Surgery was a known evil. And despite its threat, it somehow felt more manageable.