Meeting Dr. Mann, Thorasic Oncology Surgeon

Hi!!  I hope you are having a great day!!

It's the final weekend before CHRISTMAS!  This has always been my favorite time of year.  This year we have so much to be thankful for!

Dr. Mann, our Hero!

During the drive to San Francisco for my Appointment, we were able to look up Dr. Mann and read all about him. He hails from Stanford and Princeton!  From his biography, "His areas of expertise include lung cancer, mesothelioma, esophageal cancer, sarcoma and minimally invasive (video-assisted) thoracoscopic surgery."  Heres a photo of him!

You can read more about our hero HERE.

Driving to San Francisco

My Appointment with Dr. Mann was scheduled for Friday, December 9th at 3pm.  Dr. Mann does a lot of medical research in China, therefore his surgery dates are on Wednesdays and Thursdays and he meets with patients on Fridays from 1-5pm.  

The drive to San Francisco is always so beautiful.  I enjoyed it so much and here is the mandatory bridge photo!

Dr. Mann's Office

Traffic wasn't too bad so we arrived on time and Nate dropped me off to check-in while he parked the car.  Dr. Mann's office is in the SAME office that O'Donnell's was, before he moved locations.  It was fun seeing the same receptionist and walking into a familiar place.  I loved that the receptionist even remembered me!!  

Nate showed up and we had only sat down for maybe 2 minutes when we were called back to our room.  We walked into the room and we both stopped dead in our tracks and looked at each other.  The room that we were in, made us both question what this first meeting would entail... do you see the lined basket on the floor??  

Meeting Dr. Mann

Dr. Mann walked in, and introduced himself.  He sat down and got right to business.  

He said to me, "You have a history of sSrcoma in your right leg."

"Yes", I responded.

"Sarcoma is weird.  Its different than other Cancers, and its really rare."

"Yes", I nodded in agreement.

He said, "Well down this hallway (he pointed out the door), Sarcoma is VERY common.  I operate on Sarcoma every week.  UCSF is the best place for Sarcoma and you are in good hands."

Talk about an opening statement!!!!!

He then went on to tell me that I have two small tumors in my lower right lung that they need to come out.  He explained that this is VERY urgent and that he needed to get me in for surgery ASAP.  He told me that with Sarcoma, that the tumors in the lung can tend to pick up speed and grow fast.  So getting them out soon is important. 

Dr. Mann explained to us that they have learned that the cells of Sarcoma can lay dormant for up to TEN YEARS!!  He said that these cells in my lungs could have been there all along.  In other words, the cancer might not have spread - that they could have been there the whole time.  

He explained that with Sarcoma in the lung, that he won't need to "take margins" (cut out the area surrounding the tumor), instead he will just pluck out the tumors itself.  He said that Sarcoma in the lung tends to "ball up" and he just needs to get the tumor and he will leave the rest.

We asked Dr. Mann about a biopsy - should we just do a biopsy first? He told us, "Well, yea, I could biopsy them, but I wouldn't trust the results.  The risk of a false negative would be too great, and the surgery that I am going to perform is so low risk, that were just going to bypass the biopsy."  He went on to talk about the Minimally invasive procedure that he would perform.

We asked him how soon should we get this done.  To witch he responded, "Wanna do it before the holidays?"  Nate and I looked at each other - "YES!!!"

Dr. Mann told me that he would need me to complete Pulmonary testing as well as blood work prior to surgery but that he was going to get me in on December 22nd.  He told me that I would stay 3 days in the hospital.

If my math is correct - I will come home on Christmas day!!  No Cancer for Christmas!

JJ's FIRST Christmas

My son will be 9 months old by the time his FIRST Christmas comes around and I will be returning home from surgery (BUT, I will be without Sarcoma in my lungs).  The reality is... JJ is 9 months old... he doesn't even know which exact day Christmas is anyway.  So our plan is to celebrate JJ's first Christmas later on that week.  Oh man, we can't wait!

Thank you for continuing to pray!  Love you all!