Skin - Paul Raffer M.D.

A doctor is diagnosed with an incurable skin cancer. As he faces his mortality, and attempts to avoid it, his life parallels a New York family immediately recognizable as having a common thread with him. The doctor was adopted and has no known siblings or relatives. The doctor is offered an experimental stem cell transplant protocol and he matches someone from the international stem cell bank. The reader is led through the preparation for and the actual stem cell transplantation as seen through the eyes of an experienced physician, with detailed treatments and unexpected side effects. The reader will tour the cutting edge of cancer treatment at one of the world's great institutions, and its effect on two families separated by 3000 miles. Adoption and its psychological legacy color the emotional roller coaster of stem cell treatments. It's a story of two families, touched by and brought together by cancer.