Hi, Just an update on my brother in Florida, finally flew down to see him and he looks so bad. He has come home with hospice as he wants to die at home. I was reading his diagnose and this is what it had.
1 - Poorly differentiated squamous cell cancer of the right lung with mediastinal adenopathy. (when I left it was also in the left lung)
2 - Large cell unfifferentiated carcinoma of the colon.
3 - History of esophageal cancer with re-section and pull through 1998.
4 - Left hydronephrosis with mephrostomy tube.

He is so dehydrated that you can actually see his skull sinking in on the sides. His feet are 2x the size of his normal feet.

If anyone reads this, some of the terminology I am not sure and if anyone could put it in lay-mans terms I would appreciate it. Thank you in advance.

Hi,
I can't give you any medical advice, but just wanted to say I am glad you are with him and I'm sure he feels good about you being there for him as well.

He may not look good right now, but maybe you can think of his body as being a just a shell.Remember the good person your brother is Inside.

I'm sure that Hospice is doing everything to keep him comfortable at this time.
My prayers are with you both.

Hi:

I'm not a medical person, but I'll try to translate the terms I do understand.

1. "poorly differentiated squamous cell..." this means that the cells that are being made/found in his lungs don't look right and/or don't have the distinctive characteristics that squamous cells in the lung usually have. [A squamous cell is one of three basic types of cells, it's generally flat-looking. The lungs and quite a few other organs have squamous cells.]

2- "Large cell undifferentiated ...colon" - this is pretty similar to [1]. The key word is 'undifferentiated'; large cell refers to a sub-type of this type of colon cancer or carcinoma.

3- "History of esophogeal cancer with re-section and pull through 1998" - Sounds as though this is where it all began - in the esophagus. To get rid of this cancer, your brother's doctors removed the cancerous part [resection] and re-attached the unaffected parts.

Some information about how tissues and cancers:
a- The esophagus, like the colon and lungs has squamous cells.
b- Cancers mostly spread through the blood and/or the lymphatic system.
c- Cancers tend to spread to similar cells - from one squamous cell tissue to another squamous cell tissue.

Because of all of the above, the lungs are often one of the organs affected by the time a cancer has reached Stage 3 or Stage 4 esp. if the cancer started in a similar cell type.

4- "Left hydromephrosis ..." - Sometime during yor brother's therapy, the crown/cup-shaped portion inside his kidneys that helps urine drain from the kidneys into the urethra got blocked or stopped working for some reason. Because it's vital to get rid of the urea [urine] in the blood, the doctors performed a type of bypass [mephrostomy tube] from the functioning part of the kidneys where the urine accumulates to: a) the urethra; b) directly to the bladder; or c) into an external collection bag.

Hope this helps,
Jay

P.S. Other Posters - If anyone spots any technical errors, pls feel free to make corrections.

Thank you both for replying. And Jay the information was very informative. Thanks again. Judie

Judie,, glad to hear you had the chance to visit your brother.......did he realize this? And Jay Tor,, you were pretty much right on..........Im a credited/liscensed medical transcriptionist.