Help Rick Isley on his healing journey.
In 2013, Rick Isley was diagnosed with stage 3 adenocarcinoma colon cancer. He underwent a colon resection in October of 2013 followed by several rounds of chemo and radiation. When doing scans for the colon cancer, they also noticed a 4.6 cm mass on his left kidney which is common with colon cancer. The doctors were not as worried about the kidney mass because it was not growing. They took regular scans to keep an eye on the mass and wanted to give his body time to heal from the colon resection, chemo, and radiation before removing the kidney. In March of 2015, they removed his left kidney and the pathology showed a stage three renal cell carcinoma. Often with cancer, the chemo and radiation produce lasting effects such as muscle aches, pains, and other ailments; his body was never the same.
His bowels never returned to normal. He had several clean colonoscopies despite having different issues regarding his colon, rectum, and rectum muscles. In November of 2016, he was given the okay to wait four years for his next colonoscopy which should have been due in November of 2020. Unfortunately due to COVID, there was some issues with getting that scheduled and he wasn’t able to have one until May of 2021. He received good news and not so good news. The bowel prep did not get him cleaned out like it should have; so they did have issues with getting a clear picture but fortunately, they did not see any masses. They wanted to do a different prep and do a repeat colonoscopy in a few weeks.
In September of 2021, Rick started experiencing severe lower back/tailbone pain. He saw the doctor several times and saw several different doctors. In mid-October, it was decided it was nerve pain and that he needed the nerves burned. His symptoms continually got worse, he could not sit down, couldn’t stand up, couldn’t lay down in bed, and the pain was unbearable. On October 22, he started having more symptoms and getting worse. He was having nausea and vomiting, which we assumed were from the pain medications.
Rick never misses a bowling tournament and we were scheduled to go to Tulsa OK that weekend. We went and he was unable to bowl all of his games. If you know Rick then this says a whole lot. On Monday, October 25, he continually got worse with the nausea and lost his appetite. Tuesday, he was still in pain and could not eat but was okay. On Wednesday, October 27th his symptoms got worse. He could not walk, couldn’t sit, couldn’t drive, he was throwing up with cold sweats while burning up, was having trouble breathing, and having rectal discharge. At this point, Morgan stepped in and said “enough is enough, you’re going to the doctor and something is going to change.” He went to the doctor midday on Wednesday, the 28th and was admitted to the hospital. The CT scan showed suspicion of recurrent tumor in the rectum, with air seen in the soft tissue, several abscesses, and constipation (which also showed on a CT from 2019 and is may be a possible cause of the infection).
After visiting with the general surgeon, he determined there was some kind of very bad infection in his rectum at the previous resection site and that it is sometimes common for several years later for something like this to happen. He also noted that the infection seemed to have spread to several areas along his gluteus maximus and tailbone; and was concerned the infection was in the bone. The plan then was a MRI and a colonoscopy while starting antibiotics until we knew more. The MRI showed osteomyelitis (bone infection) at the S5 and S6 vertebras. On Friday, October 29th they did a colonoscopy and found several spots of infections and also saw the infection in the joints which caused the lower back and tail bone pain. They took several biopsies because they were suspicious that the cancer had returned. Then we waited…and we waited for what felt like an eternity for the biopsy results. Rick remained in the hospital during this entire time receiving IV antibiotics. Finally on Wednesday, November 3rd we got the news that it wasn’t cancer! Which was super awesome but the news that followed kind of brought down the high of hearing the cancer hadn’t returned. The surgeon came in and spoke with Rick to come up with a plan of care.
He was finally discharged on Thursday, November 4th with home health and IV antibiotics twice a day for six weeks. He goes to see the surgeon on November 11th for a pre-op appointment. Then on Monday, November 15th Dr. Edgecome will be preforming surgery. He will be placing a hopefully temporary colostomy. He will be unable to do the surgery laparoscopy because of scare tissue and because he will be going in with his hand to remove any and all infection he can find. He may have to remove part of the colon or rectum. Rick will then be in the hospital for at least three days then sent home with home health. We have started this go fund me because of the medical expenses. While having insurance is helpful it does not cover the cost of everything and Rick will be unable to work for several months and it is not determined at this time if he will even be able to return. The costs of medical issues is costly and any donations is welcome and will be put towards these costs and other expenses. If you aren’t able to give any monetary donations, all prayers are welcome and appreciated.