Spokane mayor to undergo cancer surgery

Spokane Mayor Jim West will undergo cancer surgery today in Seattle and be hospitalized for about two weeks, a spokeswoman said Monday.

The surgery, which has been scheduled for months, is designed to remove the last two known cancer spots in his liver, spokeswoman Marlene Feist said.

West was diagnosed with colon cancer in the spring of 2003, and underwent surgery that removed about 20 inches of his colon, his gall bladder and some lymph nodes. After the surgery, he was treated with chemotherapy.

After winning the mayor’s race last November, he underwent more surgery to check for the spread of cancer in his liver, and his doctors reported that all the cancer cells found were either dead or nearly so. That surgery was also followed with more chemotherapy, and follow-up surgery in April.

The surgery is being performed at the University of Washington hospital.