After yesterdays positive day, dad looked absolutely shattered and weak today. Apparently the nurses had kept him up since 9am and did not allow him to sleep. He had to sit and walk. This was of course to stop any DVT occurring.

The head nurse told me that he needs a lot of encouragement to exercise. She also said that he just about ready to leave the hospital. All they need to do is arrange local support from the social workers.

My fathers surgery was successfully completed today at 3pm. He subsequently received 2 units of blood as his HG levels were 10.1 before the operation.

We managed to see him at 7pm and he was in good spirits. In fact he was in really good spirits. In his happy state he kept singing and saying that he was the king as they had given him his own private room. My wife and I just looked at each other wondering whether he’d finally gone mad. We then realised that the anesthetic may have something to do with it.

The doctors said that is was a success with no complication.

This is such a big relief but we are not out of the danger zone yet. We still have the risk of DVT so the next few weeks are very important.

P.S They gave him his own private room because he was at high risk and needed to be monitored closely.

So get this, on Monday evening my mum receives a phone call from some doctor with regards to dads knee surgery. The person tells my mum that dad can not go ahead with the operation as there is an infection detected in the blood test results taken the week before…..

I’m not going to rant on about how we were messed around for 24 hours, after which we were definitively told that the surgery was postponed only to be told that its going ahead again. Oh I just have…

I managed to check my father into the hospital ward at 5pm. Surgery is due tomorrow at 12pm.

Let’s pray it goes ok.

The consultation at the London Oncology Clinic was very positive. The consultant we met with was very friendly, understanding and honest. At no point during the meeting did he try and sell the clinics services or deter us from using the NHS. My brother in law (No. 2) and I found this so reassuring and a complete contrast to the Dove clinic’s antics.

He was surprised that my father had not already started 1st line Chemotherapy and did not agree with the NHS odds of 1 in 20 of it being effective. He discouraged the use of Tarceva as my father did not match the profile of a person who would most likely benefit from it (non-smoker, female). In addition to this, Tarceva was nearly always used as a follow treatment where chemotherapy and radiotherapy had failed, not as a first line treatment. In addition to this, the consultant explained that the first line NSCLC chemotherapy agents to tackle sqaumous cell cancer offered by the NHS was the same as what he would offer privately. It would be better to push for this via the NHS rather than pay for the same treatment.

I then explained that my father was due to go through a knee replacement operation next week. This actually changed things. The consultant explained that my father could not go through Chemotherapy whilst recovering from the surgery. Instead, he suggested we start Tarceva during recovery and move onto Chemotherapy once my father is string enough after approximately 3 -4 weeks. At the end of the day, there is a small chance that Tarceva may work and it is better to try something that nothing.

So finally, we have a plan of attack and my father can go ahead with the knee surgery and we get to try out Tarceva.

In a nut shell, we had our meeting with dad’s orthopedic surgeon today….only that we didn’t. We actually had a meeting with the registrar who highlighted that the operation is very risky due to dad’s lung cancer condition.

There is a risk that dad can die during the operation. I pushed for some numbers and the registrar quoted a figure of 1 out of 20. Considering the percentages we have been thrown over the last few weeks this seems like a low risk compared to treating the cancer.

Anyhow, the registrar has arranged a meeting for next Monday to talk about our decision. Even if we say and they say yes, there seems to be at least a 6 week + waiting list. It’s not going to happen tomorrow.

I think we should start seriously looking at the private sector.

PET scan tomorrow…….pray it hasn’t spread.