breathing stoma

larryp

I have stage 3 laryngeal cancer left vocal cord and left false cord; I have had 10 radiation out of 35 and 2 chemo out of 7My Dr scoped me today and is worried about swelling around my wind pipe and is thinking about a possible temp stoma has anyone needed this

GregP_WN

Hey Larry, sorry for your diagnosis. I have a similar diagnosis, my 4th, this one is hypopharyngeal cancer. I was at the doctor today talking with to the about possible radiation for this one. It's not looking good for it though since I've had radiation twice already to the neck area for previous diagnoses. It looks like surgery to remove it all is what I'm going to have. Someone else in the head and neck bunch will have some info for you.

Dkatsmeow

When I had surgery to remove my cancer, they put in a temporary stoma. I use the word temporary because as I figured it was uncomfortable. Also it didn't help that they placed it on top of a blood clot. I kept gagging up ick. No I did not like it, but it was necessary for me to breathe. I only had it in for a week. Before I left the hospital, they removed it & I had to wear a bandage over the hole for a week until it healed up. The worse thing to me was I could not tell if I was actually breathing or not. I would try to breath through my mouth just to make sure. Good luck to you with everything.

GregP_WN

Lary, how long were you in the hospital after your laryngectomy? I have that coming up Jan 28th and have been told anywhere from a week to a month.