Here we go again.  John’s ear just won’t settle down.  They have to go in again.  The squamous cell carcinoma has returned.  It’s been an irritation.  Those dang cancer cells keep returning.  The problem has been in the bowl of his ear and on the outer ear.

This time the cancer crept down farther into his ear canal.  The ENT cancer specialist at the University of Utah Huntsman Center went after it again today.  He went as far as he could reach down toward the eardrum, but the margins were still not clean.  He will have to go back in with a more intensive surgery, putting John completely out.  Today he didn’t require a breathing tube, just some general sedation.

The next time they go in, they will scrape all of the flesh and tissue from his ear canal and then put skin grafts in.  Squamous cell cancer is usually just on the surface of the skin, but it spreads at will.  Hopefully the next time they will be able to remove it all.

After the surgery.  You can’t see much from here.  The bowl of the ear and the top of the ear have been scraped clean in previous surgeries with skin grafts taken from his thigh.

Loopy John!