Day at the Maastro Clinic for Cancer Treatment

Marcel graciously drives Martijn and Suze to the Maastro Clinic for Cancer Treatment, adjacent to the azM (Academic Hospital Maastricht) for a follow-up visit to check the lymph drain inserted last Thursday. Tuesday, October 30, 2007





Dr. K.B.I.M. Keymeulen decides Martijn needs extra stitches to close the little wound where the drain is inserted. A leaking wound invites bacteria and, as she prefers the drain to stay put, she wants a nice dry wound there. Another surgeon comes to stitch him up.





Multi-tasking to make our trip more functional, Susan meets with our angel of social work (Medish Maatschappelijk Werk), Tine Peters. Tine [Teen-a], has been a gift to us. She aided Martijn to register for insurance coverage when my policy by the *#!!**# (obscenities) Lippman Group decided to kick him out!! I haven't written about this fiasco in the blog since my priorities have been appropriately focused on Martijn's health and healing. But I assure you I will tell the story in most journalistic fashion shortly. Now Tine is helping me to transfer from this odious company so that we will both be insured properly. Did I mention that Lippman decided to kick me out and called to tell me this when Martijn was in the operating room during his second critical surgery?!? More to come, but suffice it to say that to us, Tina is an actual angel.

Here is Dr. J. Buijsen, our oncologic radiologist (radiotherapeut-oncoloog). We dropped in to see him since we were back in the Maastro Clinic where he treated Martijn initially with the chemo-radiation protocol. In fact, today we picked up the medical records so that we can begin to move forward with the next steps, whatever they may be.

Our experience is that Dr. Keymeulen and Dr. Buijsen are incredibly open to working together with us to explore options. In fact, Dr. Buijsen is off to Houston in a few weeks to explore state-of-the-art cancer treatments stateside. I hope to work with all of our medical specialists to develop a sane and robust follow-up protocol for Martijn.

It's been a busy but productive day. We also stopped by Martijn's hospital nursing floor to give a gift of Maastricht's tastiest 'bon bons" to our wonderful nursing staff. Tomorrow we must return to the hospital side for a consult with the plastic surgeon and the colostomy nurse specialist.