Hi I'm doing really well, eating is good and exercising loads to keep lymphodema and fibrosis at bay. My one question to ask is I read on here about HPV positive having great success rates of no recurrence. I wasn't HPV positive. Mine was stage one no lymphnode spread and had operation to remove tumour from my tongue 1.4cm . The margins were 2 mm short of what consultant would have liked so adjuvant RT was one of my three options which I took 30 sessions. I finished end of June and doing well considering the side effects. Just wondering if anyone who didn't have HPV positive worry about recurrence or do we have as good a chance of no recurrence as HPV positive. Don't want to worry constantly that it will come back . He described it as poorly differentiated. Non smoker and drinker. Thank you xx
Hi. Most oropharyngeal cancer is HPV +ve and while it is still an SCC it arises in the epithelial cells lining tonsil tissue, so that's palatine and lingual (base of tongue) tonsils. Oral tongue (as opposed to pharyngeal tongue) is almost always HPV -ve and I think many centres don't even test for it.
It's oropharyngeal HPV -ve SCC that has a worse prognosis than the +ve.
Non HPV driven tongue cancer has a good cure rate with little chance of recurrence especially in the absence of lymph node disease.
I think you should relax
Dani
Base of tongue cancer. T2N0M0 6 weeks Radiotherapy finished January 2019
Thank you Dani xx
