One thing about health care, you have a lot of tests done over the course of time. I've mentioned a few in my blogs. It's important that you have tests, because they are a measure of how your illness and treatment are progressing. Life altering decisions can be made based on these tests, done by and evaluated by humans. Of course, you've all heard the term "human error." I bring this up today because I made an interesting discovery after writing my previous blog. When you have a colonoscopy it is accompanied by a biopsy and pathology report. To see if there are any changes. Any progress. Any regress. Well as I looked at and read the colonoscopy report and pathology report that had been given back to me by the surgeon's nurse, I kept trying to figure out why they didn't seem to say the same thing. After all, they are meant to compliment one another and are based on the same test. My eye happened to wander up to the top of the pathology report page and I noticed the date - August 10, 2007. The day of my FIRST colonoscopy, not the one the report was attached to, the one from January 2, 2008! It would appear, therefore, that the surgeon, and quite possibly the tumor board were looking at two reports that were from six months apart and that showed very different results. Upon further research, it would seem no one has a copy of the new pathology report that goes with the new colonoscopy. My primary care physician doesn't. The surgeon apparently doesn't. So it is very possible that the radical surgery he told me I needed was decided upon based on information that was six months old. That would explain why the colonoscopy report says I have an "ulcer" in my rectum, NOT a tumor. maybe I'm grasping at straws here, but I know that there is a BIG difference between an ulcer and a tumor. It would likewise explain the differing opinions between my oncologist and the surgeon. I don't even know if my oncologist has seen the new colonoscopy or the new pathology report. Imagine if you will, if I had had the surgery that the surgeon wanted to perform based on the wrong information. Once it's done, there is no going back, assuming that they even discovered there had been a mistake and that they TOLD me. You're wondering if this is good news for me. I honestly don't know, but it definitely raises some important questions, doesn't it? At the very least, there is a lot of room for skepticism as to how much cancer I have, exactly where it is, and what the surgical options are based on ACCURATE interpretation of current information. I'm not comfortable with any "margin of error" or "oops factor" on this one. If you go back and read my blogs, you may detect a pattern here with my dealings with the medical profession. You will not find it to be a ringing endorsement of them. To paraphrase the trailer for the movie "Jaws," - Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the doctor...

Still alive and kickin' - despite them all

Love yas