Living with brain cancer
September 25th, 11am: I sat in my doctor's office at UCSF waiting for the results of my MRI. I've been in this same office numerous times with a picture of mountains hanging on its sterile white walls. Even as a medical student, I wonder why we design doctors' offices this way. If you're going to make it all white, keep it all white without putting up a picture of a place patients would rather be. Otherwise, and preferably, make the room more warm, welcoming...human.
In my last post, Sailing New Seas: My Biopsy Results and The Need For a Cure, I recounted my experience receiving news that my tumor has evolved to a grade III anaplastic oligodendroglioma. Given this news, the path of treatment is uncertain. UCSF's tumor board had one recommendation while my doctors in Boston had an alternative view. Each opinion is equally reasonable. The difference lies in the fact that I am now in uncharted waters. There's no map navigating me to my destination. In fact, no one truly knows where we're heading. All I know after receiving my results was I needed to find a captain for my ship, so I headed back to Boston to see Yoda.
Jeremy's Journey 