My father is an 86 year old with early stage dementia and Alzheimer's. He continues to decline and most days cannot remember the previous day.
My wife is the primary caregiver and he lives with us in our home.
We are torn with our decision on many different levels and are seeking some advice from others who may have faced similar decisions with the elderly and cancer
My Dad [93] is always having skin cancer moles removed.... his are done right in the Dermatologist's office, a numbing shot is given in the spot where the mole is located, the mole is dug out, stitches are done, bandaged, and sent home. Nothing else is needed except a follow-up visit. Dad got his skin cancer due to helping his Dad out on the farm in the fields, back in the 1920's and 1930's.
Another consideration is that cancer in elderly progresses very, very slowly. And ask yourself if Dad would rather live with tge slow decline of dementia that also takes many years and is very difficult for all involved. I have been caring for my Mom for three years now and each day is a bit more difficult for her. If she understood that her brain is slowly dying and her condition is only going to get worse I know she would choose to have her life end. And we now all hope for a stroke, heart attack, or something that will take her faster than the long slow decline of dementia.
It looked terrible, would not heal and was not responding to antibiotics, so something had to be done. She was constantly picking at it. It went very well and it was closed with sutures on the inside, so she was not tempted to pick at it.
As it turns out, it was not cancer. We were quite alarmed, because her mother died from cancer that started out as skin cancer on her face.
Her mother had cancer on her face when she was in her 80's. She was too weak for any treatment, but radiation. That worked quite well, but it came back a year later.. She was too weak for chemo or surgery. She was even too weak for the tests. She did not have dementia. She said she wanted to leave the hospital. She went to rehab at a nursing home and died within 2 weeks. She told me she was ready to go.
I have been reading professional articles about palliative care. It's quite informative. It involves taking each case individually and deciding what would make that patient the most comfortable and cause them the least amount of stress.
If you do nothing, what would the outcome be? How fast does this type of cancer metastisize? What would the doctor do if this were his parent?
At that stage, I think you go for comfort care and not heroic measures to save someone's life - but that's just my opinion (and that of my family, including my 94-year old mom).