Hemangioma / Hemangioendothelioma: Removal of the clump!

Tomorrow I go into surgery at California Pacific Medical Center, in the Stanford building at 2351 Clay St in San Francisco. The surgery is being performed by Dr PA and will take around 3-4 hours. Hopefully they can manage to cut the entire tumour out, together with a safe margin of healthy tissue around to make sure that all tumour cells are removed. In total that will probably be around 5 cubic inches of soft tissue and the 11th and 12th rib on the left side. The soft tissue is primarily back muscle that needs to be removed. I am hoping that they won't have to remove any part of the pleura, which could potentially make things more complicated.

This course of action was also recommended by oncologist Dr SJ at Stanford Medical Center that i saw this morning. I was very impressed by Stanfords facilities and by Dr SJ. She explained the rareness of this tumour but did concur that since the pathology and scans where so indeterministic, the the safest thing was to remove it.

I will be in hospital at least 3 nights, so if you want to come to visit you are welcome. Then once I get home, I will probably be pretty much bed bound for a week they estimate, and I won't be allowed to walk in any stairs for around a month after.

After the surgery, pathology at CPMC and Stanford will take a look at the entire sample, and try to determine what needs to be done next.

I am writing this 4 hours before we need to be at CPMC, I am feeling manic and in a very good mood, if there is any time I've felt happy to be manic it would be now.

Hope I can update this soon again with more information!