Melodie McClure
Melodie McClure says it’s hard enough being a teenager. But throw in a cancer diagnosis, and high school anxieties become mere inconveniences. McClure Family When she first noticed the tiny nodule on her jaw line, she thought nothing of it. Her family physician Becky Steinke, however, was concerned and sent her to an Ear, Nose and Throat doctor. Nobody was able to diagnose Melodie’s condition until she and her mother met with a renowned physician at Mayo Clinic. After weeks and months of CT scans and MRI’s, Melodie finally had a name for her disease: Sclerosing Mucoepidermoid Carcinoma, an extremely rare cancer of the salivary gland. It took five hours to remove the tumor. Dr. Moore, Melodie’s doctor, was stunned. In his long career, he had seen only four of these particular tumors, and Melodie’s was the only tumor with extensive nerve involvement. During her diagnosis, surgery and treatment, she cried only twice, and it wasn’t because she had cancer. Nor did she cry after 30 round