I'm pleased to share that Susan is in the recovery room and the surgery went very well.  Here are details provided by Elizabeth Epley who is with her today at Yale. 

Part 1 of surgery-excision: Dr. Roche was able to remove the entire tumor with “beautiful, clean margins”. She is confident that all of the cancer is “out”. She tried to do as minimal damage as possible but was forced to go through the soft palate and a little bit of the hard palate which will make recovery a little more challenging for Susan. Overall, all the potential things that Dr. Roche and Susan were worried about didn’t happen. No long term tracheotomy, no feeding tube etc.

Part 2 of surgery: reconstruction. Dr. Mehra says “Susan is doing great... this is the best possible scenario and what we hoped for.” He reiterated that the cancer was all out and that was their number one concern. He was able to do a “moderate” repair with the surrounding hard palate and soft tissue, without using some techniques which are much more invasive and painful. This is what Susan hoped and prayed for. He tested his work to see if his repair had a “tight seal” and right now everything looks “perfect”! He expects that Susan will have a complete and full recovery with no long term, speech, swallowing or other unpleasant problems. In the short term it may take “3 days or 6 weeks” for her to be able to swallow comfortably and speak.

Both surgeons agree that it looks unlikely that Susan will need radiation but that depends on the final pathology results and tumor board review.

I think given how things could have gone, this is all great news. It will be a painful and challenging recovery, but Dr. Mehra said not too far in the future, you “most likely won’t be able to tell she had any of this done”.