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Mediastinum


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Asking if any Limited Stage SCLC patients were diagnosed with cancer in the mediastinum ( in addition to having it in one lung). My understanding is that there is still a chance of cure but very small as opposed to those who do not have cancer in their mediastinum ( which is the space between the 2 lungs). Thanks for your support.

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Hi Carly,

Good to see you posting and will be praying for good reports on the bronchoscopy.

Having SCLC in the mediastinum at the time of diagnosis doesn't preclude one from being limited stage. Limited stage SCLC is generally defined as limited to the chest and lymph nodes that can be included in a single standard radiation therapy port. I've never seen anything that says that limited stage patients with mediastinal node involvement do worse than limited stage patients without any node involvement. I certainly may have missed something and if anyone else, maybe John our research pro, can find studies that say there is a difference, I'd like to see it myself.

I originally had my primary tumor in the left lower lobe and one subcarinal (right under the branch in the trachea) lymph node and was limited stage.

Sam

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Thanks Sam. I found a way to get on this message board while at work. I don't think I am suppose to ----- but I tried it and it worked.

I asked my radiation doc and that is what he told me. He said, there is a chance of cure but smaller chance of cure if in the mediastinum. I wrote it down in my notes back in November of '02. Let's prove him wrong!!!!!!

When asked about how long it would take for a relapse. He also told me, because I responded early to treatment, I could expect a relapse in one year. Again, hope he is wrong.

Thanks for the support ----

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Carly,

this is Karen C., Dave C's wife. I believe that is where Dave's limited stage SCLC was. He had a spot in his left lung and then on the lymph nodes in the middle of the lungs. Hopefully he'll see this post (or I'll remember to remind him to look at it) and correct me if I'm wrong.

He's done GREAT, so far. We'll see tomorrow and Friday just how great, when we meet with his oncologist and radiologist. You can look at his sig line and see what they did to him. but basically he had six rounds of chemo, six weeks of radiation, 15 days of PCI (which was really hard on him but well worth it if it doesn't what it's supposed to do) and every CT scan so far has been NED.

Good luck,

Karen C.

p.s. I'm not supposed to use the internet for much personal stuff, either, but I lurk here at least once a day (I'm at work now, too!). It's the only way I can make it through most days!

:twisted:

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Thanks for your reply ----

My concern was that once in the mediastinum, the cancer had a chance to travel through the lymph nodes and at sometime in the future may show up again or at another location. That made sense, when my radiologist told me it may come back in a year. I believe jonathan is doing research on this.

Have a wonderful day --- I have to get back to work.

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