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Hi,
Actually China, Japan and Taiwan have the most combined population of cholangiocarcinoma patients and all theses countries are very upto the tasks to treat CCA. I am not sure about the Chinese research on this subject, but the Japanese are on par or even better in CCA research and proposals to treat this disease . So I do not think it is necessary to come here for treatment.BTW, the risk factor of your father CCA may be different than patient here in America and Europe. Here, in the States, without health insurance, most likely I will be dead by now or my retirement saving would be long gone after the three resections that I had. It does not worth the expenses. I know I have a couple patients whi did want to come here for treatment from China,since they can afford the expenses.
It seems to me that you are very good in English if you translate the pathology report by yourself to English.May I ask what professional fields you are in?
Please be sure to understand this is a difficult disease having a lot of ups and downs just be prepare and pray hard.
God bless.

Welcome Lizzy to our remarkable family but sorry you had to find us. Glad your husband went through the Whipple as well as he did. My Teddy was 73 and it bought him 5 1/2 years. He had clear margins and no mets. 5 DOCS (ONC, Radiation etc) said no to Chemo but that was 8 years ago and some things have changed. They felt because of his age and that everything was clean he didn’t need it. It returned 3 years later where his Duodenum used to be and he had radiation and Cyber Knife. That bought him 2 more years. About mid way through his 5th year it returned again to the same place and there was no more they could do. The ONC told him he had about 6 months and asked him if he wanted Palliative Chemo and he asked the ONC, “IF I have the Palliative Chemo how much time will it buy me?” The ONC said another month. Teddy thought about it for 3 days and decided no, he rather have quality time. This is one of the hardest decisions a patient has to make.
I know it must be very hard to have Dad across the world. I go along with Marion that you might want a 3rd opinion to see which one of the other 2 the 3rd one agrees with. Wishing you all the best of luck and just know that the decision Dad makes is the right one for him! Be strong and please keep us posted as we truly care.

Hi.

Please note: I am only a patient and not a doctor.

According to NCCN guidelines: (American national comprehensive cancer network):
Extra hepatic CCA:( ECCA)
. For patients with resected,margin-negative ECCA with negative regional nodes, observation,fluoropyrimidine or gemcitabine based chemotherapy or fluropyrimidine based chemo radiotherapy are acceptable options.

According to (ESMO),the Europe Society of Medical Oncology:
. For both intra and extra hepatic CCA, suggest supportive care or palliative chemotherapy and/ or radiotherapy after a noncurrative resection, and consideration of postoperative chemo radiotherapy as an option after complete surgical resection.

So if I were your dad, since he is by all standard is relative young, and if he does not have other health problems like diabetes or fast heart beat( A Fib) and he has the distal kind of CCA which recurrence is the lowest among other form of CCA( 50%) I will suggest to follow the NCCN or the ESMO guidelines to have adjuvant chemoradiation as indicated. And follow your dad’s surgeon suggestion . It will provide a 10-15% chance for decreasing the chance of recurrence in the future.
But it is not a guarantee either.
But for sure, this will be a life changing event that no one wants, but the key is to keep uptodate knowledge about this disease ,CT Scan every3-6month, and try to catch the recurrence earlier enough to allow more treatment option rather than only chemotherapy.
Will your dad be treated here in the States in the future?
God bless.