Kelly, I would suggest that you assume that the densities are lung mets,
also that they are ACC. My initial doctor was very aware of ACC and its
proclivity to metastasize to the lungs, when he saw these spots on my
x-ray he immediately suggested an oncologist. At the time my oncologist
didn't know too much about ACC so she sent me for fine needle biopsy, but
the nodules were too small to catch. She then sent me for a surgical
lung biopsy just to be sure they were ACC. Of course, they were. But
for three years now we have been looking at them every six months and
there is no change in them. We know that they are there, and are
overjoyed when they don't change, but we are also always looking at
treatments for the time when they become problematic.

Hi Kelly,
My original site was in the small salivary gland under the tongue March
1999. I also had the surgery and radiation. I had a "density" on my
chest xray 2 years later. My radiation oncologist told me "not to worry
until he told me it was time to worry". That was what I wanted to hear
and he was right. I was very ignorant about this disease until June of
this year. My husband and I didn't want to know what it was about, and
we preferred to think we could "lick it".. In June of this year, I had
a biopsy of one of the several "mets" to my lungs. It was positive for
ACC. We were then forced to face this thing head on and know as much as
we could.

Kelly, I was diagnosed with ACC 1999. Primary site was left submandibular gland. I
had surgery with follow up radiation at Hopkins. I feel great about the local
area and the recovery. However, there is always that fear of recurrence in
lungs. The thing is the doctors want me to have x-rays of my lungs. The thing
is that-why? If our treatment options are so few. I don't think I want to
know if I don't have any symptoms why put my self through the mental stress.

My lung mets/nodules appeared in 1993-I wanted to have them biopsied to make sure they were ACC but my physicians here at Mayo would not do so since they
said biopsy in this situation may simply disseminate tumor cells further. I appreciated not going through with it and their explanation made sense. They
have behaved like ACC lung mets and that was enough proof for me.