End med 2

I saw, by far, one of the worst skin lesions in my short time at the hospitals yet. A pleasant elderly woman came to the clinic today, battling the mid-stages of dementia. She had recently had two skin cancers, two different skin cancers, removed from her forehead. Her surgical wounds had healed up nicely. Unfortunately one of her cancers progressed and had started eroding away at her cheek. The lesion was reported to be over 6 cm. It was even starting to erode away at her ear and a part of her ear looked like it was dangling by a thread of tissue. She wasn’t in any pain, thankfully, it’s just that the lesion was ulcerated and was oozing blood and fluid, so it was a mess. The only thing they can do, apparently, is irradiate it, hope that it heals well and hope it doesn’t get any bigger.

I enjoyed my time in medical oncology. I thought it could be interesting before I got into it, and after seeing it, I’m convinced that it is still on my list of “maybes.” I’d naturally have to come to terms with not being able to halt the progression of a lot of cancers, but the field is really cutting edge and breakthroughs are being made all the time. I feel like it is a specialty that can give people a lot of hope, but one that can also crush all hope when we have to explain that a patient is palliative and all we can do is treat symptoms. Not that I think that that is the worst thing possible, I’ve even thought about going into palliative care but that was a short thought and I haven’t seriously considered it, yet. Naturally it isn’t easy explaining to a patient that all we can do is help make them comfortable until the end.

I am writing my presentation and report that are due at the end of the week. Then, all I have to do is wonder what the next two years of medical school will bring me