Hello All,
I'm writing in hopes to connect with others who are knowledgeable and/or have experience with Squamous Cell Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer. My 72 yr. old Father was recently diagnosed with Stage 2 Squamous Cell. It was found when a pulmonary saddle blood clot was detected after breathing problems. He is very lucky to have survived that! He has DVT in right leg with huge clots. He has AFIB caused by blood clot and will need to have his heart shocked. He takes Lovenox shots 2x day for blood clots. He had his entire left lower lobe removed. He had a about a little under a 3cm nodule and out of 28 lymph nodes, only the one closest to the lung mass tested positive for cancer cells.
Oncologist says that for stage 2, he has a 5yr. survival of about 35% with the surgery alone. The chemo would only boost his survival by another 5% according to the Dr. So 40% survival total if chemo is used. According to Dr., Squamous Cell is aggressive and he says can return over 50% of the time. Therefore, the Dr. did not sound very encouraging about chemo and said that this is a hard call for him too. The chemo would be Carboplatin and Taxol for 4 months once a month. Conversely, if he elected to do nothing, the cancer could spread to other places and at that point chemo wouldn't even been offered. If he does the chemo it's basically a shot in the dark and they don't know if it's working due to there being no tumors at the present time. He also said there's a possibility he may not come back but we just don't know if any undetected cancer cells escaped from the one lymph node and where they are hiding.
My Father always had good health and then suddenly that all changed and now he's dealing with multiple issues. He is overwhelmed and is unsure of what decision to make. Only he can make the decision but I want him to be well informed and to really take time to process all of this intense information. I'm having a hard time finding information online about Squamous Cell Lung Cancer and it's treatment. What I have found is very general and does not go into too much info. One website had a poor survival rate for this type of cancer. Only 16%. That's the lowest I've read so far. Trying to think positive but it seems like a damned if you do damned if you don't situation. My mother had ovarian cancer and now I'm in shock that my only surviving parent is now dealing with cancer too. I too had cancer and am a 5 yr survivor of Stage 4 Hodgkin's lymphoma. Needles to say, it's just been too much cancer in my family all too soon!
Hoping to hear from others who would like to share their experiences of Squamous Cell or know someone who has dealt with it. In the meantime praying for more answers, clarity, strength, and peace of mind. Thank you.
