Dan You Have Cancer - The Oncologist and the Hospital

The time between December 28^th and January 8^th when I could get in to visit the oncologist seemed like an eternity. Cancer was confirmed but the extent and severity of it was yet to be told. On that first visit I got to meet my very own oncologist. Now I had been told that I was to see Dr. Sarah Panini or was it Dr. Sara Panini. In either case it did not matter. That day I learned that it was Dr. Rajesh Surapaneni. Not a Sarah, a Sara or even a female but one heck of a good doctor and a better person.

Dr. Surapaneni was unable to perform the total physical exam he wanted to because my back and ribs were so sore I was unable to lay on the exam table. In the Bible when scripture begins with ‘verily’ it means that the words to follow are very important and deserve your total attention. If the verse begins with ‘verily, verily’ what follows is darned important and worth of your total attention, sitting up straight and anything else that prepares you to become enlightened. If the verse begins with ‘verily, verily, verily’, well I cannot imagine to importance to the words that would follow. Thinking back I do not remember if my oncologist began with ‘verily’, or ‘verily, verily’, but Ann and I treated it as if he began ‘verily, verily, verily.’ We were told that what I had was serious, extremely aggressive and needed to be treated post haste. Without treatment life expectancy would be several weeks or months at best. Happy New Years, Ann and Dan! We were then introduced to staff that was to schedule my forth coming chemo regime. Home I went to prepare for the fight of my life. Off to work Ann went to try and achieve some sense of normalcy.

I was barely home fifteen minutes and my phone was ringing. Caller ID said it was Andrews and Patel, my oncology practice. Surely there was a scheduling conflict or I had inadvertently left something behind. But nooooo! It was the man himself, the newly discovered, the lead dog, the man in charge, Dr. Rajesh Surapaneni on the other end of the line. Using his man-in-charge leader voice, the voice that left no doubt that what he said should be identified with ‘verily, verily, verily, I say unto you’ told me the get myself to the Emergency Room at Community General ASAP, STAT or any other combination of letters that meant N-O-W! They would be expecting me. He explained that my lab results from the morning bloodletting showed the calcium levels in my blood were in the red, critical range. This was a first for me. I have had reserved seats for the theatre, many baseball games and reservations at restaurants throughout the years but never have had reservations at the hospital ER. Cancer certainly can change your world quickly.

A quick call to Ann to come home and get me was followed by the short trip to the ER. The ER waiting room was packed. I gave them my name then took a seat among the masses. After a very, very short wait (not to be confused with verily, verily) a triage nurse sat down at an unoccupied service window and called my name. I did not look because I knew it wasn’t necessary. I could feel them. Hundreds of eyeballs were watching me as I stood up, transversed the crowded room, went to the desk, gave the nurse my name and was promptly without hesitation greeted by yet another nurse who escorted me out of the line of fire, into the inner sanctum of the hospital ER.

Striped, gowned, placed gingerly into a bed, I was quickly surrounded by a bevy of nurses, LPN, RN and whatever other types there are. A bevy of nurses is probably a misnomer in that they were all caring angels to me so let’s change that to a host of nurses. When they discovered I had tremendous back pain they provided some magic pills that caused me to float about six to nine inches above my bed. Nothing hurt, heck nothing even mattered at that time. For the next four to five hours I was asked questions, poked, stuck and sent for several scans. Details of all this somehow escape me at this time. I do know it was the best I had felt in a very long time. Sometime after nine o’clock or was it ten, I left the ER and was placed into a regular room. I was staying the night. As the high of the magic pills wore off I began to spend one terrible night trying to sleep in a hospital bed. Remember I had been sleeping in a recliner for two months straight at this point in my life. Other ‘magic pills’ were provided but none had the same effect as those in the ER.

Wednesday I was told that I had cancer in the following places; jaw, skull, ribs, sternum, hips, spine, liver and brain. Not a problem. It is better to know one’s enemy than it is trying to fight something that doesn’t fully expose itself. Before that battle could start however, the seriousness of the calcium levels needed to be addressed and diminished.

I have always had trouble with IVs in that my veins are deep and are of the shakers and movers type. Even if you are lucky enough to find them the challenge becomes hitting them and making a solid connection. I expressed my concern about be confused with a pin cushion one morning when one particular ‘blood sucker’ tried six times to draw blood. Even though I tried to be as kind as I could, I knew she understood where I was coming from when I mentioned the pin cushion analogy.

Several very positive things happened the rest of the week. First, I only spent one night not-sleeping in the hospital bed. I moved to a recliner next to my bed from then on. Two, I became friends with the dietitian who then became very helpful in providing me what I wanted for each meal. Momma didn’t raise no fool. Third, I was able to witness to the clergy that came in to encourage me. I don’t think he ever heard someone in my condition say the things I said. At least that was what the expression on his face said. Fourth, they sent me home on Friday as my calcium levels fell back inside the acceptable range, not good but acceptable. One last positive was that the nurse practitioner assigned to me by Andrews and Patel came in special to see me and explain that I did not have cancer in the brain. Small victories were realized but victories big or small are non-the-less victories. 

Prayer works! Praise the Lord!