Hi Daniellabella—welcome to the best club nobody ever wants to have to join! I see that you have posted on the tail end of a few threads as well as starting your own—always good to start your own thread like this when you want a lot of traffic to see your questions, etc.
I am by no means an expert, but I could sense the panic and worry in your posts and wanted to help out as best as I can.
Daniellabella wrote:
1. Why would we be asked to meet with surgeon I’d colonoscopy, MRI and CT aren’t done?
2. Is the cancer rectal or colon? My understanding is colon cancers have surgery, and rectal cancers have radiation/chemo and surgery after.
If this is so, why did the doctor that did the sigmoidoscopy make it sound like it’s colon (stating surgery first, then chemo)?
3. My husband has a 6 cm non-circumferential más at about 10-11 cm from the anal verge. What’s this mean? Is it particularly bad?
4. The photos taken during the sigmoidoscopy show lots of brown and white patches. Is that the cancer? If so, I am FREAKED OUT because it looked like tons of bulbous, bubbly skin with white polka dots and long, twisted, brown bands that looked like worms. Does that sound like stage 4?
1. Chances are that the doctor who did the sigmoidoscopy knew from the appearance of it that it was in all likelihood cancer. When their job is to look for these things day in and day out, they have a pretty good sense (certainly not perfect, but a high percentage of accuracy) when they believe they are dealing with a cancerous mass. As for the surgeon, make sure he/she is board certified for colorectal surgery—makes a big difference as that is their specialty working in that particular area.
2. Well based on it being at the recto-sigmoid junction, could go either way and perhaps even be considered both as I have heard a few on here be in that same boat. Don’t get too far ahead of it yet, wait for the colonoscopy which is the number one test you want performed first and foremost for helping with diagnosis/staging.
3. Again, I am not an expert, but my understanding of non-circumferential is just how it is “spread” out on that section of the rectum/Colon wall. I don’t believe it makes a difference and that it is just a descriptor of how the mass is laid out, but that is just my belief—perhaps someone with more knowledge will be able to confirm or deny this?
4. If it makes you feel better, no one’s interior pics look great—keep in mind what you are looking at.
As for being a stage IV, that has nothing to do with appearances, one is considered stage IV if their cancer has spread to an area/organ outside of the colon (metastatic). One is considered a stage III (like me
) if there are lymph nodes that test positive for cancer. Stage I and II depend on the depth of the tumor. So wait until your husband gets the colonoscopy and pathology reports and then the CT scan and MRI to fully know what all you are dealing with.
I truly empathize with you both—I was going through that nightmare of diagnosis three years ago this August and I know it sucks and feels like you’ll never get back to some semblance of peace, but it just takes time. You want to rush on the one hand because you want to get the cancer out, trust me, we all felt that same way at the start, but you also get one shot at a first chance to target it accurately so also take the time to get a proper diagnosis and find a team (oncologist, surgeon and possibly radiologist) that you truly feel good about as you are literally entrusting them with your husband’s life. Many people do second or third opinions until they get that right fit. Chances are that tumor has been in there for a bit so if it needs to wait another few weeks before you get a treatment plan in place, it will be worth the wait.
Every time you find a new piece of information out, come back and update us and ask questions. There is always someone here who is willing and able to answer your questions—we’ll let you know we’re not experts, but we can share our experiences to help you gauge your husband’s. Do the best you can to hold it all together until you get those tests done and find out more definitively what your husband is dealing with.