05 Aug Dick Raab Diagnosed with Cancer

Dick Raab, a retired minister in Michigan, has been diagnosed with sarcoma cancer. He begins radiation treatments around August 24, and chemotherapy will come after that. On Monday, August 4, we received this message from Dick’s wife, Donelle.

“We went to the oncologist this morning. He said without treatment Dick wouldn’t make it past 5 months. With treatment he could live several more months, even years, there is just no way to know at this point. There are some extra spots, too, on the outside of his lung. It is too hard to know if those spots will take off and grow or not. They could stay dormant for a long time and then grow quickly. Or, they could be the same kind as his tumor and grow very fast right away. There is no way to tell.

“We do know that things were slowed down, at least temporarily, by the removal of the large tumor. The rest of the tumor that the surgeon couldn’t get and ‘still have a live patient’ needs to be treated as soon as healing takes place enough that he can be treated. We have an appointment next Monday with the radiation oncologist to go over radiation treatment possibilities and the possible date to start up treatment. The extra spots on his lung will be treated with chemo after the radiation is done. It all doesn’t sound like a pleasant fall even in the best case scenario.”

You can send a note to Dick by email.