Surgeon supports fellow surgeon

In late October of 2024, Marshall Poor, MD, a local neurosurgeon pictured above and to the left, noticed that his tongue was sore. Not thinking much of it, he dismissed the pain.

Soon after, he ran into an IU Health physician in the surgery locker room who, upon inspecting Poor’s tongue, promptly referred him to Otolaryngologist and Head and Neck Oncologic/Reconstructive surgeon Mohamad Saltagi, MD. A biopsy led to Poor’s diagnosis of squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue.

“My wife told me, ‘You’re going to the Mayo Clinic or Clevland Clinic’ and after I met Dr. Saltagi I just said, ‘No. I know where I’m going to be,’” says Poor.

“I felt a heavy responsibility in caring for another surgeon,” says Saltagi. “Once we were in the operating room, we approached it like any other day and put our best foot forward.”

The surgery removed much of the right side of Poor’s tongue and lymph nodes from his neck, and rebuilt the tongue with a free flap transplant from his thigh. He then went through chemotherapy and radiation and is now in remission.

Poor credits this success to the immediate trust he had in Saltagi from the moment they met, giving him something to believe in as he embarked on his patient journey. And just seven months post-op, Poor was back to treating patients and tending to his 64 acres of land.

“The whole thing only felt bad maybe one week,” says Poor. “And that was at the end of chemotherapy and radiation. But I never got sick, never needed any pain medicine or anything. I was lucky.”

Inspired by the grit and perseverance he witnessed, Saltagi was reminded of the privilege and responsibility of caring for patients from all walks of life on any given day.

“It has been an absolute privilege to be part of Dr. Poor’s team. From the time of diagnosis to the moment we got to celebrate the good news of him being cancer-free, he kept a positive attitude and calm demeanor,” says Saltagi. “Now he’s back to operating on patients of his own, serving our local community and leading mission trips abroad; he is an inspiration to us all, and I am lucky to call him a colleague and friend.”