hi folks - to bring everyone up on an unrelated topic - betty.

in june - chuck posted to the n.g. about how she's been bleeding and
they can't find out what's wrong.  they keep filling her back up in
blood, but can't find the source of the leakage.

for the second time,  she has just completed the entire testing of the
GI tract from one end to end.  everything from scopes, probes and the
high tech camera pill technology and even though she has been bleeding
since feb.  the news we got today is they have found nothing, but they
know the bleeding is coming from the GI tract.  they know that she has
no cancer in the intestines, but don't have any other answers.  needless
to say, this is very, very frustrating to both of us.

but, the conversation was with the recovery nurse.  here's a person who
takes care of a lot of people and when she found out that i have
prostate cancer and an RP, she ask me if i was on chemo.  i must of
looked surprised and said, "chemo?"  she said, "yeah, do they have you
set up for any kind of chemo?"
she didn't know my numbers or anything about my prostate cancer staging.  

i just found it interesting that a person in this position would think
that this would be a common way to go.  just kicking around different
thoughts about why she would say that, i can come up with some
possibilities.  either, the patients she deals with are more advanced
cases of pca.  or the information she has been told makes her believe
that is a common practice.  

this may or may not be an isolated case.  but it does show how much
misinformation there is in the medical world and no wonder when someone
gets dx'ed with pca, who do they believe, because of so many things they
could be told.

anyway, just an observation, and a conversation.

~ curtis

knowledge is power - growing old is mandatory - growing wise is optional    
"Many more men die with prostate cancer than of it. Growing old is
invariably fatal. Prostate cancer is only sometimes so."