Follow Up Visit, Breathing Room, and Buy the Book

Had a good follow up visit with my primary health PA today. The most pressing issue is these damn allergies that are keeping my nose stopped up and my cough going. I am now armed with information and medicine, along with a routine to finally get rid of the little buggers for good.

We talked about my desires and approach to PC. My PA put my wife at ease with the information that I have on spread outside the gland. I'd tried to support this notion before, but it's good that she got the "official" word. I didn't mind hearing it again either.

Given my age and the percentage and grade of cells found by the biopsy, I have plenty of time to monitor this thing and make some considered decisions.

In this case, time is on my side. More advances in medicine and technology will be made in the next few years, all to my advantage I believe. And, while that time goes on, I might get caught by the grim reaper in entirely some other fashion.

I must repeat. Don't get rushed into anything you may regret.

Whenever the subject of prostate cancer comes up around men, and women too, the cancer word kind of takes over the conversation and perceptions of most people. As the authors of The Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers point out, for most of us, this should be considered as a condition rather than a disease with the reputation that cancer enjoys. But, I've seen this happen, the attitude and perceptions of those involved in the conversation always move toward doing something. Treatment. Cure.

I've not met many men who had PC, or have it, that were not moved toward some kind of treatment pretty early in the diagnosis stage. And, most did not fully understand the consequences of treatment.

Don't let that be you. Buy that book and learn about what we are dealing with - the condition, and the industry that has developed around it. The Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers. A most significant and important book.

The Depression Group

Yesterday I drove for an hour to attend a prostate cancer support group. Once I found the place, I couldn't find the group meeting place. Each room I was referred to was vacant. I then saw five men sitting around a table in an open area and walked over. Yes, this was the place. They had decided to move, but had not left a notice of that anywhere. Not an auspicious beginning. It soon got worse.

I had to tell my story, of course, but I didn't get all that far before the group, exclusive of the leader who seemed to be up on the topic and very open minded but had to leave to attend to business, took over. The basic story was that each of the four men there had already undergone some form of treatment, and, as far as I could tell, were not thrilled with the outcome. Some talked as if they were "cured" while others worried about remission. All complained about some undesirable side effect. Incontinence was barely mentioned but alluded to of course. The focus of discussion quickly moved to the need to make a decision on treatment and get on with it. Just the opposite of my belief.

I mentioned that one good thing about waiting on any kind of treatment is the likelihood of new and better options as medicine learns more about PC. While most of the men agreed that this was true, they didn't want to linger here. Their main focus was telling stories about their treatments, their doctors, and a little about side effects. There was much discussion along the lines of "what's your PSA? What's your gleason?" Sort of like, "what's your sign."

However, running through the conversations was the fact that all of them had been rushed into a treatment decision by their doctors. One man recommended that I go to a local doctor who was an "expert" in PC. I knew of this doctor. He is a radiation oncologist, and guess what, he favors early treatment with radiation. There was also a recommendation to see this robotic surgeon. "He's really good." There was discussion about needing both seed implants and general radiation together. Some gruesome tales of treatments of various kind. Only one of the group mentioned that he wished he had waited before jumping into treatments.

I also learned that one of the urologists I had been referred to is the guy who slammed one of the group with a 6-month effective hormone shot very soon after his diagnosis. Looking back, the patient wished he had taken the time to understand his condition and options, and the possible side effects of various treatments. He would not have acted so swiftly.

In the end, these men validated what I have been learning. Most doctors will treat PC, regardless of it's severity, as something that needs treatment rather quickly. Their recommended course is whatever their specialty happens to be, naturally. Regardless of the fact that men with high risk factors are no more likely to die within ten years than are men with low risk factors. And, the likelihood is around 5%.

In addition to all this, little discussion was made of the risks of these radical treatments, especially surgery, on older men. One of the guys suffered a severe infection resulting from a biopsy, but this didn't raise any red flags. Probably because, other than him, the rest had escaped serious consequences, or didn't talk about them.

So, rather than support, I felt depressed. I need a group of men who are more understanding of PC and modern thinking on the subject and some who are refuseniks like me who prefer to keep their quality of life and wait.

I know this sounds harsh, but the general impression I left with is that these men are afraid to die. Now, I am fearful as well, but I also know that dying is the natural end of life and the manner in which we choose to live, and to die, matters. Undergoing long and difficult treatment processes, with life-altering after effects that seriously degrade those few years left does not seem worth it to me. If I was not seventy years old, I might think otherwise.

One of the men, the least educated of the group, but probably the most perceptive, said something to the effect that it really doesn't matter. You might get killed by a car tomorrow.

Exactly.

Support Group Meeting

Tomorrow I'm driving to Pueblo, Colorado to attend my first UsTOO support group meeting. I've never been strong on groups. All of the groups and clubs I've joined in the past have been duds, except for one, which isn't so much a club as a like-minded bunch who enjoy getting together each month and talking about their favorite hobby.

I suspect this PC support group will be different. Prostate cancer isn't a hobby. It's a reminder that life is short, we are all mortal and the journey will end sooner or later. I think having PC is a good thing in that it brings the doorway into view for the first time. We all know it's out there, the door to the undiscovered country, but I think most of us don't really believe it. Too far in the future (whatever that is), too abstract and mostly something other people have to experience. Not any more.

The more I think about this, the more I am convinced that as Lincoln was supposed to have said, "It's not the years in the life, but the life in the years." I am not signing up for a short segment of life lived with awful and undignified side effects. Personal quality of life and medical ethics should intersect in a doctor's office, although it has been my experience that it most often does not. And, from the source materials I read, especially the book, The Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers, that healing intersection does not exist for the majority of health professionals dealing with men with prostate cancer.

One of the authors of The Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers, diagnosed with PC and unwilling to be pushed into surgery, was told variations on, 'you are stupid', 'you'll be dead in a year', 'we'll schedule you for next Tuesday." Although during the diagnosis meeting, I got the signs that my urologist was harried, new to the profession, pushy and totally unfamiliar with doctor-patient relationships and the caution to 'do no harm' and fired him later than I should have, reading his notes later told the same sad tale. Even though my incidence is low-grade and low risk with no evidence of the cancer spreading anywhere else, he noted that he thought I shouldn't do watchful waiting because, "of the risks". He didn't bother to elaborate on what those risks are. Probably because they are low to non-existent, given my condition and age.

A 2008 study by the Mayo Clinic published in the Journal of Urology, April 2008 shows that only 2% of men with Intermediate-Risk and only 5% of men with High-risk PC die from it within ten years. So, given my Low-risk status, and age of seventy years, what kind of risk drove my urologist to state that I should undergo surgery because of the "risks"? I think one of the reasons might be that he wants to operate. That's what he does.

Right after the diagnosis in his office, accompanied by "facts" from my tests and biopsy fired at a machine gun rate, without benefit of consulting or explaining the actual findings themselves (he kept all of the paperwork to himself) he launched into a commercial for robotic surgery, which, it turned out, he was specializing in. He didn't spare the details, although all of his details were good. He didn't talk about the dark side, possible complications of the surgery itself, the extreme difficulty of doing the surgery right even for those who were vastly experienced and capable. Which he was not. He didn't mention that one of the most imminent urologists in the country stated that the would only operate on a man over seventy if both of the patient's parents were also in the OR. Like, never happen.

I subsequently learned that in order for a surgeon to be very good at robotic PC surgery, the average level of experience needed is 240 operations. Taking into account the number of years my guy had been in practice, multiplied by the standing of the medical school he'd graduated from, I figured he was going to need another ten or fifteen years before he would be at the level I'd trust to even seriously consider him doing such a procedure on me.

One of the big reasons I want to attend the support group meeting is that I need the reality-based opinions, knowledge and experience of others who have gone down this road before. It is too often the patient, hearing the words, "you've got cancer", is so vulnerable that he is too open to bad advice given by authority figures at the time. Good thing for me that I am stubborn, cynical and a born "refusenik", to use Ralph Blum's term, or I might have put myself in the hands of a doctor who was not so much concerned about the overall health and well being of his patient, but his own career and practice. If I sound harsh, well, it is a harsh reality.

It's a minefield out there and you have to choose your path carefully. Make sure it is your path, not someone else's. After all, it's your life to live how you choose.

Some good news for a change.

Yesterday I learned that my bone scan came back clean. That's the good news. Interestingly, I did not learn this from the urologist that referred me, the one who did my biopsy. He is the one who refused to talk with me about it over the phone. I learned of this from the PA who works with my primary care doctor - over the phone. The hospital that did the bone scan procedure sent the materials to my urologist's office. They forwarded this information along with the rest collected by his office to my primary care doctor. The PA had the kindness and good sense to just straight out tell me. The urologist was insisting that I pay him an office visit for the same information. Now, I don't really know the reasoning behind his decision, but I have the thought that it might have something to do with charging me for an office visit.

I do know that I have already received a bill for the first office visit, which, from experience with the billing processes from other medical offices around here, falls into the super-efficient, very quick category.

I have an appointment with a radiologist, referred by the urologist's office, on Friday. My sense is that although I was told by the urologist that there is no rush in choosing a treatment method, I am being rushed into referrals and appointments dealing with treatment methods. There is a lot more to learn and understand about what's going on in my particular case before I get to the point where I choose a treatment. My wife has ordered a copy of a book entitled The Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers. Before I make any kind of decision I will read this book, and read the fine resources provided to me by my daughter and friends.

I can see where it is easy for a person in this situation to feel that something has to be done quickly, and to just not think about it too much and do what the doctor says. Problem is, some doctors have a limited repertoire of responses mostly focused on what they have trained for and practice. Understandable from their points of view, but not from mine.