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Hi Mommers,
This is indeed great news, just in time for the holidays. Thankfully, your husband’s cancer has been determined to be caught at a very early stage.
I hope your husband has an uneventful recovery from surgery.
Regards, Mary
Update:
My husband had his surgery on 11/26/18. It went better than expected! They did go in with a camera first to insure no spread before they opened him up.
They were able to lift the liver up to see the tumor – originally they were going to take the gall bladder & 1/3 of liver & replace the IVC with a synthetic one. They ended up leaving the gall bladder, only taking 5% (caudate lobe), & were able to patch the IVC instead of replace. They said surgery could take up to 12 hours but it was only 6 1/4 hours – we are so thankful!
Pathology came back as pT1aNO, Stage 1, no lymph nodes involved.
We see the surgeon & oncologist on Tuesday the 18th for follow up & to get staples out.
We will find out if he will need chemo pills or not.
Any input from anyone with similar experience would be appreciated- TIA!My husbands surgery has been scheduled for November 26th – we had hoped sooner, but it’s a lot of people involved so I’m sure that’s why it’s taken longer to get a date.
He seems more tired than usual but I don’t know if that’s from the stress or maybe not sleeping as well? I said he had no symptoms previous to finding this & he hasn’t had any blood tests for a while. Is it something we should be concerned about?
Thanks!
Hi Mommers,
Welcome to our community. It is very good news that your husband is able to have surgery.
Liver resection surgeries, as your husband’s doctors have described, can be complex. From what you describe, your husband’s surgical team is highly skilled. Also, prior to a major surgery, doctors will take steps to ensure the patient gets through safely. In my own case, for example, I was sent for a stress test of my heart prior to surgery. Also, the doctors performed a laparoscopic look-see of my liver to determine that the surgery was feasible just before starting the operation. My own surgeon was also a liver transplant specialist, this is not uncommon.
I am guessing the chemo pill afterwards is capecitabine. This follows a major study from Great Britain that showed benefits from capecitabine after surgery. If you look for “Bilcap” (the name of the study) on the internet, you can read about these results.
If you search “resection” on the discussion board, you can find patient and caregiver stories about their experiences.
Also, please send any questions or concerns our way.
Regards, Mary
Thank you for responding!
My husband has made the decision to have surgery. We should hear this week on the specific date. Because it involves the transplant team to replace the IVC there are a lot of people involved.
I will update when we know the date.
Hi,
Sorry for your husband. I also recommend the surgery as it is the best curative way against adenocarcinoma.
All my prayers to your family
Élodie from Canada
Hi, sorry to hear about your husbands diagnosis. I was diagnosised a year ago with a similar diagnosis as your husband. Mine was intrahepatic (in the liver) pressing against the inferior vena cava. At first we thought I only had one the one tumor but further screening showed I had the one against the vena cava and two other smaller tumors. (3). I underwent chemo to reduce the size of the major tumor and ended up only doing 3 chemo sessions because I got a bacterial infection. I recovered from that and they decided to go ahead with the surgery in February. My major tumor was removed as were the other two and 50 percent of my liver. Margins and pathology good no lymph node invasion. Surgical procedure was: Gall bladder removed, extended left hepatictomy including a resection of the middle hepatic vein, cholecystectomy, segment VII liver resection, portal lymphadenectomy, intraoperative ultrasound, caval resection , caudate lobe resection, caval reconstruction. Following recovery from surgery in April I started adjunct chemo taking Capecitabine (Xeloda) in pill form for a regime of 2 weeks on one week off for a total of 8 sessions. I am currently in my final session and then after one month I will have my MRI scan to see if there are no reoccurrences. I feel very lucky and hopeful that there will be no reoccurrences. Good luck and I hope this description of my treatment helps. I recommend the surgery. I live in Portland, Oregon and my surgeon was Dr. Kevin Billingsley at the Oregon Health Science University.
Hi all!
My husband has a adenocarcinoma tumor in his inferior vena cava that they think is Cholangiocarcinoma. I am wondering if there is anyone else out there who has had this same thing in the IVC. Back story… he has had stomach/bowel issues since last fall & started doctoring for it in February. His primary care doctor sent him to a GI Specialist in July after he had exhausted what he knew what to do. After many, many tests he ordered a CT scan of his stomach in late August & this popped up in his liver. A biopsy showed it was cancer, but only the general term adenocarcinoma. After many more tests & another biopsy of another part of the liver this is the only place they can find it.
He has been given a surgical option of taking the gall bladder (it’s in the way) & 1/3 of the liver & then replacing that section of the IVC with a synthetic one. This would be done by a transplant team. There is a risk to the surgery higher than normal. He is healthy & active & shows no sign of anything wrong (all tests normal). He would most likely take a chemo pill afterwards.
His second option is aggressive radiation for 5 days a week for 3 weeks. They could possibly surgically remove it a year or so down the road if it hasn’t spread anywhere else.
They don’t even think this is the reason for his stomach / bowel issues.
Because this is so new to us & I don’t know all the names & terms yet any info or help is appreciated.
His doctor is in touch with a doctor in Toronto who is an expert & 2 of the doctors on the transplant team have trained under him so we feel we are in good hands.
Thanks!
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