Cancer detected after lymph node biopsy

Hello,
Within the past year my 76 year old father underwent successful radiation treatment for prostate cancer.  Within the past 6 weeks doctors removed an enlarged lymph node from his neck for biopsy.  The positive results prompted a chest xray confirming he has squamous cell lung cancer.  I live in another state and Dad keeps insisting he does not need me to come at this time.  I very much think it is important for me to be there with him for doctor visits, support, etc.  I honestly feel he is being very evasive in telling me all that is going on.  I don't even know what stage his cancer is in other than info on the web that indicates it is not good.  Can you please level with me as to the severity of his condition and how I can go about getting him to accept my help. What kind of time frame might we be looking at here.  From what I understand the only course of action recommmended at this time is kemo.  He is rather frail to begin with.  Would this only prolong the inevitable and rob him of any quality of life he has left?  He is a VERY stubborn man.
Thank you

[HeinrikMD]

Hi,

I think you need to have more information before you could make estimates.

Lung cancer is rarely found in the early stages, and the early stages do not have cure rates as good as they are for other cancers like breast cancer. Lung cancer is also number one in terms of cancer mortality

As far as quality of life goes, you could expect a number of symptoms to come from the lung itself: cough, spitting blood, difficult breathing. Other symptoms would be related to metastatic sites, like bone pain. For quality of life, there are a number of treatment options.