I drove to Cascade Valley Hospital in Arlington on the morning of February 12 for what appeared to a routine ultrasound test. My doctor wanted a look at my bladder, and since the scan would be “in the neighborhood,” he made a last-minute decision to include pictures of my two kidneys.
When the ultrasound was finished, I asked the technician if he saw “anything interesting.” He said my bladder was functioning normal. And my kidneys? He declined to answer, saying something to the effect that he wasn’t at liberty to discuss results, which sounded ominous. That was the radiologist’s job, he said.
The radiologist didn’t take long to release his findings. I hadn’t even finished the 25-minute drive back home when I got a “ping” on my email that I had a new test result in “MyChart.” I was stopped at a red light on Highway 532 just west of I-5, so I instinctively opened the message. My eyes fixated on the words “solid mass lesion.”
I’m no medical expert, but those words were unsettling. I had left my home two hours earlier a healthy man – at least as far as I knew. I returned home acutely aware I had a mass half the size of my right kidney. I had no symptoms. The results, of course, also went to my primary care physician, Dr. Alden Campbell. A few days later, he called me.
“This looks concerning,” he said. “I’m ordering a CT scan.”
The CT scan would confirm or deny my doctor’s suspicions it was cancer. If it were cancer, the CT would also show if it had spread to nearby organs. The CT scan was scheduled for the following week, also at the Arlington hospital. Once again, the results came back quickly.
I didn’t immediately think the term “renal cell carcinoma” was cancer. I’m new to this world. I thought, or hoped, it might mean “pre-cancer.” But Dr. Campbell called me and told me it was indeed cancer. The good news, he said, is it appeared the cancer was contained to the kidney, and had not “metastasized.” That assessment would later be confirmed by my urologist and my surgeon.
“I think we caught this early,” Dr. Campbell told me. “You might have dodged a bullet.”
If I did steer clear of advanced cancer, I owe Dr. Campbell a debt of gratitude. To borrow a catch phrase from COVID, he ordered the kidney scan out of “an abundance of caution.” He had noticed my kidney function bloodwork tests were trending slightly downward.
“I just want to make sure,” he said before the ultrasound.
My good and friend and retired cardiologist, Bob Swenson, thinks most doctors wouldn’t have ordered the ultrasound, electing to instead “watch the numbers” going forward. My next appointment with Dr. Campbell wouldn’t have been until September.
Over the course of my life I have occasionally wondered what it would be like to receive news you had cancer. Dr. Campbell’s words were so “matter of fact,” as if I’d been told I had the flu, or bronchitis. Not that I knew it should be dramatic, like “My God, you have cancer!” Or, “I’m very sorry to tell you that you have cancer.” I guess I just didn’t know what to expect.
A few weeks later, I spoke with a friend of mine who is currently in remission from colon cancer. In her case, it was diagnosed late. The cancer had already invaded her liver. It was termed Stage 4 cancer. She has undergone “immunotherapy.” The cancer, for the time being, has been kept at bay.
“You’re entering a new world,” she told me. “You will never be the same.”
That’s for sure. Once word spread, I received phone calls and text messages from people I hadn’t heard from in years. With my cancer diagnosis, I had crossed a line.
Dr. Campbell immediately referred me to a urologist at Skagit Valley Hospital. Dr. Kyle Schuyler showed me the images from the CT scan. It was his opinion the tumor was slow-growing, and could have been there “for years.” He said he could remove my kidney – otherwise known as a “nephrectomy” – at SV Hospital, but thought the rest of my kidney looked healthy and could be saved. He said the best option would be what is termed a “partial nephrectomy.” That procedure, he said, is more complex and would be best performed by a surgeon at University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle. He put in the referral while I was still in the room.
That surgeon would be Dr. Sarah Psutka. It took awhile for the UW and my insurance to approve the referral. But once that happened, we were told we had a “pre-op” appointment on March 30 with Dr. Psukta.
I had done a little research on Dr. Psutka beforehand. It was obvious she had impeccable credentials. She is an Associate Professor of Urology in the Department of Urology at the University of Washington and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. She received her undergraduate and medical degrees from Harvard University, and completed urology residency training at the Massachusetts General Hospital. She completed a Society of Urologic Oncology Fellowship in Urologic Oncology at the Mayo Clinic, and concurrently obtained her Masters’ in Clinical and Translational Science. In our one-hour sit down with her, she was as advertised. She was knowledgeable, professional and kind.
“You’ll be well cared for here,” she told me.
She noticed my UW shirt. I told her we were Husky football season ticket holders. A native of Toronto, Canada, she said she was a hockey fan, and pulled out her phone to proudly show us photos of her two girls who are members of the Seattle Kraken “junior” hockey team.
But I digress. Back to the surgery. She concurred much of the kidney looked healthy and could be saved. But because of the size of the tumor, she would have to do an “open surgery,” as opposed to the less invasive laparoscopic/robotic procedure. That meant a large incision, a minimum three-night stay in the hospital and a longer recovery. She said, if during the three-to-four-hour procedure it’s deemed unsafe to do the partial nephrectomy, she will remove the entire kidney. She termed my cancer “Stage 1B.”
We then found out there’s a price to pay for a world-class surgeon. She’s in demand. She told us we were likely looking at surgery in “June or July.” Fortunately, we received a call the next day that the surgery will actually be May 20.
The delay does allow us to travel on May 8 to our niece’s wedding near Santa Cruz, California. I can also attend a speaker event at my church (a former UW football player and chaplain) on April 18 that I am in charge of. I had this crazy idea surgery was imminent after our March 30 meeting with Dr. Psutka.
Funny how “life happens when you’re making plans. ” I’ll be relieved when the cancer mass is removed as I continue along this uncertain journey that began the day I heard the “C Word.”
