Update: February 20, 2010

Thanks for checking out this new vehicle we're trying for keeping people updated on Tom's condition. We're encouraging family and friends to contact us through here or via email, as Mary and Tom have a fairly packed schedule between medical appointments and visitors.

As most of you probably know by now, Tom began experiencing a severe headache and "losing words," or dysphasia, while he and Mary were in San Diego. They returned to Kalamazoo and went straight from the airport to the Emergency Room at Bronson Hospital. After an MRI, Mary and Tom met with a neurosurgeon who felt that a craniotomy and biopsy were warranted. Tom underwent the craniotomy on Friday, February 12. He was diagnosed with grade IV glioblastoma multiforme shortly thereafter.

Mary and Tom met with medical and radiotherapy oncologists at the West Michigan Cancer Center in Kalamazoo on Friday, February 19th. They are very encouraged by the WMCC's ability to provide care for Tom. The oncologists feel that, while the prognosis for survival remains much the same, the quality and duration of Tom's life can be extended with treatment.

Mary, Tom, and their family are so grateful for all of the supportive gestures, emails, cards, prayers and kind thoughts that have come their way. If you'd like to help in a specific way or would like suggestions for what might be helpful to Mary and Tom, you can contact Molly Chase, their daughter, by email through this site. Because their schedule is so hectic, Mary still asks that rather than calling, you send her email and she and Tom will call back as time allows.

I also encourage you to comment on these posts--Mary and Tom will see all of these comments.