Scar tissue vs. cancer

[katherine]

My sister just got her CT scan results back and the Dr. said that the CT scan revealed a grey area and they couldnt tell if it was scar tissue from her previous surgery or if it was cancer. Are there any opinions/experiencewith this?

thanks,
katherine

[Molly]

Hey Katherine...

First of all, here's to hoping it's scar tissue.

I don't think it's completely abnormal for something like that. CT's don't see everything perfectly. They'll likely do an MRI next and if it's still inconclusive, probably a PET Scan. (Nothing like dragging it out, huh?) I remember having something like that on my CT once and that's exactly what happend (minus the PET, since I don't even think it was available then. Man, I'm old!) Eventually they ended up doing a needle biopsy (put me under, stuck me in the CT machine and put a needle in my back to extract some goo from the spot. Gross, i know!) Turned out to be fatty tissue on my liver or something like that, caused by the chemo...or so I'm told. (I think my doc attempted to blame it on the margaritas I had one night during treatment. I know. Bad, Molly!)

So...think positive first, and if it's not the scar tissue, you guys can cross that bridge when you get there.

God luck. We'll be thinking of you guys.

[Magnolia]

Something similar. I had diverticulitis last summer, and the radiologist who read my scan at the time saw "thickening" at the anastamosis that could have been scar tissue or local recurrance. My oncologist wasn't concerned at all about that. I just had another scan and the thickening was unchanged. Points fairly clearly to scar tissue, the more likely scenario. I've had three CT scans and one PET scan since surgery showing the exact same thickening. Local recurrance is less likely with this disease than distant mets anyway, but as we all well know, anything can happen.