Simplifying complicated medical terms -- continued

I said this would be the really good part of this entry, and it will. But I have to confess something before we can get to it.

I wasn’t very clear in my previous mentions of Harriet’s medical problem for a reason. Despite a battery of echocardiograms, CT scans, ultrasounds, mammograms, and MRIs, no one was completely sure of the situation.

It started with a visit to the emergency room with pain in her back and chest. After a CT scan and an EKG, we were relieved to learn that her heart was fine. However, the radiologist had pointed his equipment a bit lower than normal and noticed something else; a spot on her kidney and another one on her liver. Since Harriet is a breast cancer survivor this instantly got everyone’s attention.

To shorten this story which included what seemed like a hundred tests, the spot on her liver turned out to be a simple hematoma – nothing more than a blood blister. However, the mass on her right kidney appeared to be a renal carcinoma…cancer. The only way to be certain was a biopsy. But the superb urologist I mentioned earlier on this subject recommended against it. Cutting into the tumor could cause it to spread.

Without hesitation, we agreed to his suggestion: remove the whole kidney.

So, now you’re up to date. Harriet had the surgery two weeks ago and is recovering remarkably well. On Monday we went to her urologist and he gave us the lab results. The mass on her right kidney was a multilocular renal cystic tumor with mixed epithelial and stromal cells. We started to feel a little better when he described it as…weird. Neither he nor any of his associates had ever seen this rare tumor. He explained a bit more. It’s sort of like an intestinal tumor, but not. And sort of like an ovarian tumor, but not.

Finally he simplified it all the way down so anyone could understand: not malignant.