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I would just like to ask if the part of the sentence marked bold is correct.

My friend started her chemo yesterday and will be checked next month to know if she will have been responding well to the treatment.

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  • Do you know what the sentence (or the part in bold) means? Why do you think it's incorrect? What do you think would be a better choice? Please click on the edit link below your question to clarify. By the way, I restricted your question because proofreading requests (of entire sentences) are off-topic on ELL. – userr2684291 Feb 16 at 22:23
  • I totally understand what it means. It just so happens that I want to clarify if future perfect progressive is perfectly fine with an if clause. Thanks – Curious Lingo Feb 16 at 22:32
  • Do you find ...to know whether she will have been responding well to the treatment odd? (I replaced if with whether.) – userr2684291 Feb 16 at 22:46
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No. It is not idiomatic to use the modal "will" in such forms, except where it means "willing to" (which doesn't make sense with "will have").

"To find out if she has been responding" is more normal

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  • Even if the finding out happens a month after? – Curious Lingo Feb 16 at 22:56
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It's grammatically valid as far as I know, but it's not something a native speaker would be likely to use, certainly in that context. It would more likely be "to see if she has been responding". That's because it's acceptable, and more natural, for the tense to be relative to the point at which the checking happens. Also because to see is more natural to use in that context than to know. If you want something more formal, it should be to find out. To know is not generally used in that sense, because it does not connote the gaining of knowledge, only the possession of knowledge.

The future perfect progressive is more used for actual statements of knowledge, or predictions, rather than things that are to be found out. "She will have been running for an hour at that point, so will be tired." In a conditional or other if phrase, it would be "if she has been running for an hour, she will be tired".

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  • Even if the reference extends up to the future? – Curious Lingo Feb 16 at 22:54
  • Even then. It's just not done. I mean, I can see why, by any explanation of the meaning of different tenses in English, you would think it should be that. It just isn't. Sometimes, languages don't make sense - especially English. – SamBC Feb 16 at 23:37
  • I’ve done a little bit of research. You’re right. – Curious Lingo Feb 16 at 23:45
  • Yup., I think this comes down to the fact that English doesn't actually have such a thing as a future tense. There are a number of expressions (principally the modal will) which often have future meaning, but they don't always, and they're not always required to express futurity. – Colin Fine Feb 17 at 0:15

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