Mark Smith’s rich baritone voice not only earned him his livelihood, it was his defining trademark. “I was always told I had a radio voice, and that I should have been in radio,” says Smith, 54, a longtime salesman from McCandless, Pa. “My ability to speak with people and communicate with people – it was everything.”

So when doctors delivered the news that his vocal cords had to be removed because of persistent cancer in his larynx, it was a devastating blow for Smith and his wife, Jane. “They told me I needed ‘life-altering surgery.’ Those are three words you never want to hear,” he says.

The words took him on the most difficult, and most triumphant, journey of his life.

“His story is just a miracle to all of us,” says Kathy Siker, practice manager at Metropolitan Ear Nose and Throat Associates at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Passavant.

The initial diagnosis in October 2005 revealed a mass on Smith’s vocal cords; a biopsy showed it contained cancer cells.

Smith had thrown away his last cigarette prior to the surgery and has never had another. Getting rid of the cigarettes, which may or may not have caused the cancer, was not as difficult as he expected.

The 35 radiation treatments that followed the surgery were the challenge.

“Eating certain foods was very difficult,” he says. “Anything that was rough felt like razor blades.”

It became harder and harder for him to swallow, until he could barely eat. Smith, then a product director, worked the entire time, although he was not allowed to speak for 10 days after the surgery.

By February 2006, he started feeling better, eating more and getting his full voice back. His checkups were good until December, when Smith thought he was getting laryngitis. He wasn’t.

In January, his doctor found two more cancerous spots on his larynx. Smith thought he would have to undergo radiation again.

But Philip Pollice, MD, another member of the Metropolitan team and a specialist in treating laryngeal cancer, told him radiation was no longer an option. He recommended a supracricoid laryngectomy, a new operation in which doctors remove the vocal cords, then invert two muscles in the back of the throat to take their place.

Pollice assured Smith he would survive the cancer, but that Smith had to really want the cure and that it would be a lot of work. He allayed Smith’s fear that he would no longer be able to talk, but told him he would have a “peculiar voice” once he learned to speak again.

“All I’m thinking is, my life is made on the phone every day,” Smith recalls.

Pollice advised him he would have to learn how to breathe, swallow and talk all over again, in that order. The doctor didn’t doubt Smith could succeed.

“I knew if anybody was going to be able to do really well with this and be a fully functioning person, it’s him. He’s a survivor and he’s so motivated,” Pollice says.

Several days after the surgery in March, Smith was breathing through a tracheotomy tube inserted into a hole in his neck. He asked for his feeding tube to be removed after three weeks as it was giving him a sore throat and getting in his way.

But, it would be at least three more weeks before he could swallow easily.

After removing the feeding tube, his caloric intake plummeted from 2,100 to 80 calories a day and his weight dropped from 188 pounds to 158 pounds. Two days after removing the tube, Smith told his wife he thought he had made a big mistake with the surgery and that he couldn’t deal with it. That was his lowest point.

Jane was in severe pain, herself, as she was putting off hip replacement surgery until he recovered. She told him he couldn’t give up on her.

“That snapped me back, that was the turning point when I decided I have to get it done,” he says. “I had to get better so she could get better.”

When Smith started turning the corner, Jane had her surgery. She didn’t have to go to a rehab center because he could take care of her at home, which forced him to practice talking.

Training the inverted muscles to do the job of vocal cords took extensive speech therapy. With a lot of practice and the help of Metropolitan speech pathologist Kelly Yurasko, MSLP, CCC-SLP, Smith begin to speak again in a clear, audible voice – one that is not the least bit peculiar.

“I am tickled to no end that I’m not sounding like Minnie Mouse,” Smith says.

Although it is a bit raspy, Smith has the essence of his voice back, more so than anyone else Pollice has performed the surgery on.

“Because he’s young and he’s vibrant and he was so motivated, he just had a remarkable recovery and rapid return to speaking,” Pollice says.

When Smith returned to work in July, his company created a new position for him as coordinator of special services, in which he coordinates company functions, acts as liaison between departments and runs a new mentoring program.

“I'm back and better than ever,” says Smith. “I'm just happy to be alive and kicking and cancer-free.”

Source: Peggy Conrad/www.pittsburghlive.com