Doctor's Appointment

Today I had my first appointment with my new neurosurgeon, Dr. Andrew Parsa, at UCSF. First of all the office is BEAUTIFUL with an amazing view of the city (I know this has nothing to do with its ability to care for my brain, but it was a plus).

This was the entrance to the office. I did not know that I was going somewhere specifically for brain tumors. There were more people in the waiting room than I expected, which made me think "How often do brain tumors occur?" Well, apparently they aren't as rare of a diagnosis as I had thought.

This is the view from the waiting room. It's a great view of Golden Gate bridge and the city. 

The entire staff was super friendly and took their time to talk to me and make sure I was comfortable and had all of my questions answered. We especially liked the nurse practitioner who was thorough, knowledgeable, and friendly.

Anyway to the point. We met with my neurosurgeon and he had what I consider to be good news. So he said that he is pretty certain (90% sure) that the tumor I have is called a pineocytoma, which is a benign slowly growing tumor that can be cured by surgically removing it. Great news my doctor specializes in removing brain tumors and removes these types around 5-10 times a year. Now the doctor said there is a small chance (obviously 10%) that it is something else and there are two ways to find that out. First we are going to do a more in depth MRI the week before surgery to make sure it's still there, looks the same, and doesn't appear to be a cyst. Then after they remove it they will run tests to see if it is malignant and if it is we will figure out what to do from there. 

We are planning on having the surgery mid-late February. The surgery will consist of me sitting up (asleep) and the neurosurgeon removing part of my skull in the back of my head to access the third ventricle (or the fourth I can't remember) which will lead them to Timmy. 

ventricles

AND THEN THEY SHALL CUT HIM OUT WITH THE VENGEANCE OF A THOUSAND FIRES!!!

The neurosurgeon said I will be immediately transferred to the ICU and then after a night there I will spend around 3 nights in the hospital. The whole recovery time should be about a month total and after that I will be back to myself!

Which means....I may not have to wait as long to be an OT as I had previously thought! 

The neurosurgeon seemed really awesome and told me I need to make sure I de-stress and focus on preparing for my registration exam.

So good news? Yeah it's major surgery, but it's not months of radiation, possible radiation related side affects, and delaying my chance of my dream job. I'm calling it good news.

Alyssa