Unique – Dan’s Story Video Recording
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[SOFT MUSIC]
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A man wearing an orange jacket and hat walks in the snow.
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Dan: Hi. I’m Dan Novi. I currently live in Gurley, Minnesota. I have been a welder most of my life.
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He was sitting in the living room with a lady sitting next to him.
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This is my wife Tina. We have four children in total. I have two. She has two. I enjoy hunting, fishing, and just hanging out outdoors most of the time. When we moved here over a year ago, our plan was to purchase a farm. We planted 300 Christmas trees, an acre of strawberries, and raised some chickens. There are big plans. You know, we had everything prepared for the future and everything seemed fine, and then found out in April that I had lung cancer. Plans changed dramatically. I was working and coughed and something came out. It was blood.
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He heads to a hunting blind in the snow.
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I said, I need to go in. We need to check it out. We knew beforehand that it was going to be cancer because probably, when you cough up blood, you’re going to have problems with your lungs. Then it was checked out. Had a CT scan. They came back and said, yes, it’s cancer. The doctor said that our options at that time might be chemotherapy and radiotherapy. But then we did some more tests, a PET scan. My doctor in Fargo said maybe we could do the surgery there. So we went to Dr. Marks. He looked at it. After many tests, we collectively determined that surgery was possible, but risky. They knew they had to remove the entire right lung. We did breathing tests and so on and came back. You know, our lung capacity is only 35%. So he thought I would be on oxygen for the rest of my life. You know, we sat down and talked about it. We decided to do surgery and take out the right lung. Tina: It wasn’t an easy decision to make. But going into surgery, I knew he would live longer if the lungs were removed. With chemotherapy and radiation, I knew life would be shorter, and I wanted him to live longer. DAN: On August 16th, we went to Fargo. We completed the surgery. But during that time, four hours passed and five hours passed. She became nervous and restless. She walked over to the nurse’s station and said, where is my husband? They called back to the surgery and said Dan would be in for another hour and a half. So the operation lasted 7 hours in total. She was so upset that she took my daughter back to the hotel and collapsed.
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In the photo, Tina and Dan are smiling.
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They called her back and said Dan was done with surgery. So she rushed back and then I think she got really excited to see me without oxygen. I have been moving around a lot since the surgery. From anywhere, like, all the way to the chickens and back is 120 yards. I probably went a little further than that without oxygen. There was no oxygen for me at home. Since then I’ve been doing really well with just one lung.
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We are near the main entrance to the Essentia Health facility. We enter an examination room. Logo, Essentia Health, Fosston.
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So now I’m doing chemo in Fosston, Minnesota which is only a 20 minute drive and 2 and 1/2 hours to Fargo. Essentia in Fosston is also a great place. Great doctors, great nurses. I will have my last three chemo treatments there. Number one in my care of Essentia is Amy. She’s always on the phone with me. She gave me her phone number. If I have any questions I can call her. She made sure my needs were met etc so I appreciated that. Dr. Marks’ surgery was outstanding. I can’t thank him enough.
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Logo, Essentia Health Cancer Center. MRI machine in the scanning room.
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I was walking around on one lung and we both thought I needed oxygen. When I spoke to him at my first appointment after surgery, he was amazed at how well I was doing. So Essentia took great care of me.
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Dan and Tina walk in the snow. Words are unique. The Essentia Health logo appears, consisting of three leaves in a circle.