Coastal Cancer Treatment Center

I took my camera with me yesterday and today when I went for my radiation treatment.  Here are some of the pictures I took.

This is the building, The Coastal Cancer Treatment Center.  To the left there is a lovely pond and a meditation garden beside a stone wall.  Also to the left and down the hill there is a picnic table.  It is lovely here in the summer and fall, but everything right now is buried in snow and the pond is iced over.  Someone keeps a path shoveled around the building so the bird feeders can be filled.  You can watch the birds from the two waiting rooms and the exam rooms.  I've seen chickadees mostly and a male cardinal.

Leslie is the official greeter.  She keeps everything running smoothly in the front office.  She has the most incredible smile!

I get a new wardrobe in the locker room every day--I get to choose the gown I want (open and untied in the back, please)--I prefer the ones with the darker green print-- and a lovely blue robe.  Sometimes there are blue and white striped robes which I like the best as they are longer and actually can tie closed in the front.  I at least get to wear these to and from the radiation treatment room.

This is the linear accelerator machine and the table I lie on.  The room is kept fairly cool because of the equipment.

This is me covered with a warm sheet waiting for the procedure to begin.  The table has been adjusted to quite high off the floor.  The machine is automatically adjusted and lowers to give me radiation first on my right side.  Then it moves up over me and down on my left and I get a dose from that orientation, too.

When I am finished, and it only takes a very few minutes, the linens get put into a hamper, and one of the radiation technicians (there are usually two or three) scrubs everything down and then the table gets reconfigured and adjusted for whoever is next.

Then I go back to the locker room, discard my gown and robe into the hamper, treat my skin with some fresh aloe, and get dressed. Then it's, "Bye, Leslie!" and I'm on my way again. I'd say I'm there for thirty minutes or less most days, from the time I greet
Leslie until the time I bid her farewell.

I have several ways to get there and back and have tried all of them by now--through Richmond and then taking either Route 128 or 127; Route 201 to Topsham and then the highway to Bath; or the Interstate in Richmond to Topsham and then the highway to Bath; or from Topsham I can go through Brunswick and take Route 1 to Bath...No matter how I go, it takes about 45 minutes one way.

And you've gotta love the poster in our waiting room there...