Oncologist Appointment

I had another oncologist appointment today. Everything looks good.

It's been 6 months since my last appointment. That's a little longer than usual. In fact, my oncologist told me last time that he'd be OK with seeing me once a year. I know lots of long-time patients will wait that long between appointments. I also know that the majority of the time, if Follicular Lymphoma progresses, it's the patient who notices, rather than a blood test or scan or doctor's check-up.

Still, I like knowing that it's only 6 months between visits. It's comforting.

(We all deal with this in the whatever way makes most sense to us, right?)

I've been seeing Dr. V. Unlike my last oncologist, Dr. V is a lymphoma specialist. I have nothing against generalists, but I like having an oncologist who knows a lot about my disease. We usually have good conversations.

The appointment was pretty standard. I had blood drawn first, and then went in for a chat with the doctor. He asked if everything seemed OK, if I was experiencing any problems he should no about. Yes, everything seems OK. And No, nothing unusual. He did a physical exam, feeling around for any swollen nodes or organs I might have missed. No problems there.

We talked about my next appointment. Again, he offered to let me go for a year. "If there are any problems before the next appointment," he said, "you can always call me...or someone else...."

Wait -- what is that supposed to mean?

And then he told me -- he was offered a job doing Immunotherapy research at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York.

Ugh.

But I can't blame him for going. He's fairly young, and getting the chance to do that kind of work in that kind of hospital is fantastic. As he said, he'll be surrounded by established researchers and he will learn a lot. If I had the chance to do something similar, I'd jump at it, too.

And so, I came home with the good news of having good blood work and no new symptoms, but the bad news of needing to find a new oncologist. This will be my 4th one in a little over 3 years.

And so, I start the search again.

I will say again, as I have said before, I realize that I am lucky that I even have a choice. There are plenty of Lymphoma patients who do not -- they live in an area where there is only one oncologist, or their health care system tells them who they are able to see. As unlucky as I am to keep losing oncologists, I'm very lucky that I can look at a few and be the one to decide which one is for me.

The most important thing, though, is that I had a good check up, with no signs of my FL being anything but stable.

I wish you all that same good luck.