Central port summary - green light for exercise

Today we had a meeting with the thoracic surgeon that will install my port. I had a concern that I wouldn't be able to mountain bike with the port in (assuming I have the energy to mountain bike..). But he said it would be ok. He puts the port in fairly high on the chest - it will be above my collar bone on my left side. From there it's a nice gentle arc of the catheter into the superior vena cava vein that goes into my heart. So even if you fall you'll probably hit things in such a way that you won't damage the port. There are probably some sports - wrestling, boxing, etc. that wouldn't be good. And if you had some job like a mail carrier that put a heavy sling on that shoulder all day it might get irritated. But for what I do it should be fine. I'll get the port in a week from Friday. No general - which is nice - just a thunder sedation with an anesthesiologist present. An outpatient procedure - I'm getting good at showing up for outpatient procedures.

The oncology nurse agreed that having a port was definitely the way to go. As with all of these things, there are some possible problems - a blood clot in the vein that has the catheter in it, an infection around the port, etc. But these are pretty small percentage issues and having the port makes getting the chemo so much easier (and safer - you definitely don't want Adriamycin leaking out of a bad needle placement in your hand or arm burning the shit out of the surrounding tissue). So it's a calculated risk but I think the right approach.