Stanford Tackles Tough Tumors Once Thought Beyond Treatment

07.01.2011

I just knew they were doctors at Stanford, and that people come to them from all over the world.

-Michelle Perea, cancer patient, Stanford Hospital & Clinics

When Perea was diagnosed and told nothing could be done, her youngest child was just 2 years old. After the first surgery, a never before done procedure, removed an 11-pound tumor from her abdomen, her cancer returned three years later. Stanford surgeons went in again to remove that tumor, too.

Perea's mother, Diane Lawson (left), has been an important part of her recovery from two cancer surgeries, ground-breaking approaches made possible because two Stanford surgeons pooled their expertise.

It almost seemed as though he was thinking, 'She's only 38 years old. We have to try and do something - we have to do these things that seem impossible.'

-Michelle Perea, cancer patient, Stanford Hospital & Clinics

With her tumor removed, Michelle Perea knows she has gained more time with her family: son, Diego, 6; husband, Mike; daughters Sophia, 14, and Olivia, 16, and Allejandra, 8.

It's just old thinking that if a sarcoma has invaded a major blood vessel, that there's nothing you can do but give patients palliative therapy.

-E. John Harris, vascular surgeon, Stanford Hospital & Clinics
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