Well, I could now give full details of what is involved in a colonoscopy, but I'll spare you the details. Suffice it to say that it's quite odd seeing your own insides on a TV screen. The staff were all wonderful and I have nothing but praise for the way I have been treated at the local hospitals. The procedure itself actually wasn't too bad - the worst bit was the preparation for it when you twice swallow a solution of magnesium citrate. If you know what that does, then you will share my discomfort; if you don't know, google it and be happy it's not you.
They removed a single polyp from me and that had to be sent for biopsy. I was told that it looked OK based on the doctor's knowledge and experience of these things, and it was duly confirmed as "normal" just over a week later. They'll want me to go through the whole thing again in three years just to see if anything has changed. So, right now, I'm fit and healthy after that scare and I'm back on track in the kidney donor process.
The speed of this whole thing has been remarkable: I had the letter with the failure result on a Wednesday, was seen for assessment the following Tuesday, underwent the (slightly unpleasant) "further investigation" on the Thursday of the week following and received the biopsy result eight days later (if no samples are taken then you are told you're clear at once). That made 23 days from start to finish, including Easter. I certainly cannot complain about the NHS!
I understand that the next step is tissue typing and cross-matching to see if my brother and I are compatible. The transplant nurse in London has persuaded another local hospital near here to do this to save me trips to London and this is now booked for next week. If this is OK then there are lots more tests they want to do, about which I have no detailed knowledge at present. I know they will also want to assess me mentally to make sure I know what I'm doing and also to be sure that I'm not being paid...!
In the colonoscopy preparation meeting I was asked how I felt about the situation. I didn't really know at first but realized that in fact I was quite annoyed as the threat of cancer was getting in the way of the possibility of helping my brother. That question did make me wonder about how I felt about undergoing a (personally unnecessary) major operation voluntarily, even to help my younger brother. To my surprise I realized that I'm not in the least bit fazed about it; it just seems part of life in the same way that I accepted the possibility of having cancer myself. You've got to die of something, after all!
Showing posts with label cancer screening. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cancer screening. Show all posts
Monday, 23 April 2012
Wednesday, 4 April 2012
The Rocky Road
Somehow I didn't think that this would be easy. The decision to offer a kidney to my brother was easy I thought but, as a pretty fit person all my life, I was not ready for what has occurred almost concurrently:
I passed 60 quite recently, and as a result was invited to participate in a bowel cancer screening programme. My first samples (I won't go into details!) were rated as "unclear" so they asked me to do another set which were "normal" but, just to be sure, I was asked to do a third set of samples. This came back last week as "abnormal", together with an invitation to attend a meeting at my local hospital. This meeting was yesterday (they don't hang around!) and I am now booked in for a colonoscopy on Thursday next week (that sounds like a bundle of laughs).
It turned out that my sample results actually were encouragingly low: on the first set, only one out of six showed any symptoms, and it was the same on the third set. Thus I have reached this situation on the least possible amount of positive results, i.e. just two out of eighteen. Apparently 2% of people on this routine screening get an abnormal result: five of every ten who have a colonoscopy have no further issue; four of every ten have some other cause like piles or polyps, and just one in ten actually has bowel cancer. Immediately after the colonoscopy you are told if they have taken any samples for biopsy - if not you are clear. Biopsy results are available within a week, so either way I will know the results within twenty three days of getting the original letter, which is pretty good I think. We are all too readily critical of the NHS, in my view.
In the meantime, I have already spoken to the transplant nurse and explained the situation. She will progress the question of tissue samples with my local hospital and then we await the outcome of the colonoscopy. If I'm OK, I can then get back on this road to becoming a live transplant donor, which should then be a bit less rocky!
I passed 60 quite recently, and as a result was invited to participate in a bowel cancer screening programme. My first samples (I won't go into details!) were rated as "unclear" so they asked me to do another set which were "normal" but, just to be sure, I was asked to do a third set of samples. This came back last week as "abnormal", together with an invitation to attend a meeting at my local hospital. This meeting was yesterday (they don't hang around!) and I am now booked in for a colonoscopy on Thursday next week (that sounds like a bundle of laughs).
It turned out that my sample results actually were encouragingly low: on the first set, only one out of six showed any symptoms, and it was the same on the third set. Thus I have reached this situation on the least possible amount of positive results, i.e. just two out of eighteen. Apparently 2% of people on this routine screening get an abnormal result: five of every ten who have a colonoscopy have no further issue; four of every ten have some other cause like piles or polyps, and just one in ten actually has bowel cancer. Immediately after the colonoscopy you are told if they have taken any samples for biopsy - if not you are clear. Biopsy results are available within a week, so either way I will know the results within twenty three days of getting the original letter, which is pretty good I think. We are all too readily critical of the NHS, in my view.
In the meantime, I have already spoken to the transplant nurse and explained the situation. She will progress the question of tissue samples with my local hospital and then we await the outcome of the colonoscopy. If I'm OK, I can then get back on this road to becoming a live transplant donor, which should then be a bit less rocky!
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