Sigh of relief

We met with Dr. Tchou today at Penn. She is calm, thoughtful, very smart. She took time to review everything, ask meaningful and pertinent questions, explain procedures and options, give recommendations. We were so impressed with her. And we must have all been holding our breath, because when she told us that surgery is scheduled for Wednesday, June 22, we exhaled so strongly and audibly that even she must have felt the weight lifting from the room!

So I will go in on Wednesday for a re-excision biopsy, lumpectomy, and sentinel node biopsy. This requires general anesthesia, but it is still outpatient surgery, so I won't have to stay in the hospital overnight. Her description of the procedure is excellent: she will "shell it out like a bird's nest." Love that. As a rule, she does not do frozen sections because she thinks it's too hard for pathologists to use it because the tissue is too fatty. So it would be another week before we get the results about the margins and the node. It would be another surgery if there are problems, but I think she's being really smart in her plan. I see Dr. Glick on Tuesday, so everything is falling into place!

Hurray!!