Pat Vaughn re: Sugarbaker

[Guest guest]

Hello Pat,

My husband is doing okay after having Dr. Sugarbaker's surgery/heated

chemo. He also had to have a second surgery after the big one three

days later due to a leak in the bowels and this resulted in an

ostomy. As noted they removed over 50 tumors but because this was

the third recurrence it was hightly recommended that he have

additional chemo of Oxliplatin/5fu which he took from May through

Sept. We did not want to do this because he did not have good

response before but it was explained to us that since Dr. Sugarbaker

removed the peritoneal lining of the abdominal wall that the chemo

would have better penetration to the abdominal cavity, so we did

chemo. He was not able to do what I call the " rotissire " it is where

after the Sugarbaker surgery they pump chemo in your abdominal cavity

and rotate your entire body every 30 minutes this is done for 5 days

after the surgery. We really wanted to do this because this

eliminates having to do intravensoully chemo but because my husband

had radiation and his colon had radiation burns Dr. Sugarbaker was

afraid to do this procedure hence chemo for 5 mths after. Right now

his scans are all negative and blood work normal. He does have some

pains, strong enough to be on a continuas pain patch, that we and the

local onc. are monitoring because it is all to similar to the pains

he has had before. He has lost a lot of weight but we believe that

this is because of the ostomy. He HATES the ostomy I think most of

our problems are from this, not getting enough nutrition. But...he

would not be here had he not had this surgery. We do enjoy life we

have been on two cruises since July so our quality of life is okay.

Yes we have our okay days and our really bad days. He is only 44

yrs. old and we have been fighting this disease for 4 years. As far

as Dr.'s in Europe I do know that Dr. Sugarbaker goes overseas

espeically Europe to give seminars/training. While we were there in

March I think he went to Austria to do this. And we called last week

for follow up info and he was out of the country. As the others on

the board have mentioned France I believe that one of our interns

that worked for Sugarbaker was here from France, very nice Doctor.

I'm sure if you called or emailed his office they would recommend

someone who has trained under him, who knows he might even be there

at some point. If you call his wife Ilsa usually answers the phone

she is very helpful and so kind. I hope this helps if not you can

email me for additional info. Sometimes we forget to include all

info. just because there is so much. So please don't hesitate to ask.

Thanks Deb