HPV Immunization

I forgot to mention in my previous post that my ENT also recommended my whole family get vaccinated for HPV, minus my nine year old who should wait until he's twelve.  I asked if it was really beneficial being that I've already tested positive for HPV.  He told me the latest vaccine covers nine variants of HPV, seven of which can cause cancer.

What can happen is that they can team up and create a more aggressive cancer.  So even though I've tested positive for it it's best that I get the vaccine to prevent infection from other strains which would increase my chances for getting a more aggressive HPV related cancer.

I also heard that there are a lot of HPV strains, with new ones being discovered all the time and asked him about that.  He deferred to his intern who said that we know of around 200 strains of HPV. The vaccine covers the most common ones.  Definitely worth consideration, especially for people who are not in a monogamous relationship.  If only they knew about HPV and had a vaccine 30 years ago.

HPV Results Positive

The tests results came back and I'm HPV positive.  My second ENT was right.  He said he was sure my cancer was caused by HPV and he nailed it.

I got this information right before seeing my oncologist.  I told him and he didn't seem surprised.  I don't remember his exact response.  He did say that cervical cancer is caused by HPV 99% of the time.  He suggested we get our younger boy immunized against HPV.  Nothing we can do for me and my wife, it's already in us, we just don't have any of the symptoms, except my cancer.

I just looked it up and the CDC says 79 million American's have it.  That's 1 in 4.  So it's pretty prolific, but preventable.

I think it's pretty great that we live in a day and age that we now know about this virus, we know it causes certain cancers and we have a vaccine for it.  You can prevent the virus and you can prevent some cancers.  Pretty awesome gift you can give your child.

Second ENT Doctor

I met my second ENT doctor yesterday.  He seemed very practiced and confident.  Maybe too confident?  He gave me a positive prognosis.  He's pretty sure it's in my tonsils based on the CT scan.  He doesn't think the PET scan will provide more information except if it's spread to other organs.

He said there's two routes to go; a lot of radiation and chemotherapy or surgery and less radiation.  He recommended surgery because he's pretty sure of where it is.  If they didn't know where it is or can't find the tumor then the only option would be radiation and chemotherapy.

So he wants to go in and remove what he thinks is a tumor on my right tonsil, which corresponds to the side of neck where the swollen lymph nodes are.  That would go straight to pathology to confirm that's the cancer.  If it's confirmed then they remove my lymph nodes and the next day I go home.  Recovery from surgery is about 2 weeks then after that I do 2-3 months of radiation.

If it's not in the tonsil then he would feel around for it.  He said they have a 98% chance of finding it in surgery.  If they can't find it then they just end the surgery and I go the radiation/chemotherapy route.

He said the survival rate is on the plus side of 70% and if I survive this the chance of it coming back is rare.  I asked him if age is a factor in the survival rate and he told me not really.  He said a greater factor is how well your body deals with cancer and how aggressive the cancer is.

We talked about the cause and I asked him if he thought it was smoking/alcohol or HPV related.  I had an HPV test but haven't received the results back yet.  He said it's almost definitely caused by HPV and was sure the test results will come back positive.  He said typically the alcohol/smoking caused cancers don't manifest until you're older.

Regardless, he said no alcohol, including mouth wash would be a good idea.  I knew alcohol contributed to cancer but I didn't realize that just gargling with it and not drinking it did too.  He said 1-2 drinks a year would definitely not be a problem, 1-2 drinks a month would probably be OK, but more than that significantly increases your risk of cancer in the mouth and throat.  So, ya, I'm staying away from alcohol.  Maybe after I pull through this I'll have an occasional glass of wine, beer or scotch.

So, along with no more alcohol, I'm further hedging my bets and doing everything I can nutrition/diet wise to give my body the advantage and cancer the disadvantage.  A fight is not won by sitting back in an arm chair; it's won by getting up and fighting.