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Wednesday 10 February 2010

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�It�s only that little bald guy with the inferiority complex.�

There's cancer - and cancer

Wednesday, 28th October 2009

No respecter of persons, age, sex, or location. Cancer strikes everywhere in its manifold forms and in the last six months it has struck down three people in my community. Two were men in their early sixties and both had lung cancer, one was a woman in her fifties, who had cancer of the bowel. All three of them had the sort of final year which you would feel was not worth going through. The second they were diagnosed they were on an express train and they couldn`t get off, processed fast to Oncology, Radiotherapy, Chemotherapy without, apparently any option. They were told their lives might well be extended and perhaps they were but what is the point of that extension if it is one of misery and the enduring of ghastly symptoms? Quantity over quality doesn`t seem to me a good choice in this instance.

I doubt if any one of them had a good day since their diagnosis but they let the express train carry them on because none was the sort of person who would ever have questioned that the medics knew best.

Lung cancer has a dire survival rate, bowel is a bit better, if caught early. But one thing they do have in common, these two cancers – they aren`t the sexy ones. When did you last put money into a tin or have your awareness raised or see a celebrity wearing a little ribbon or attended some mega-premiere or fund-raising smart party, for lung or bowel cancer ? No, I thought not. Because on the whole they are not out there. Breast cancer is the high profile, fasionable, sexy cancer now. Tie a pink ribbon round everything, glitzy celebs wear pink, throw a pink party, ice little cakes pink – that’ll get them.

Before anyone starts, yes, I know breast cancer is no fun either, I know it strikes some young women – though it strikes older ones far more often. But its cure-rate is quite high. I have four friends who have survived years after having breast cancer – one almost fifty years, and several more whose more recent treatment looks to have been successful. I know no one who has survived lung cancer or cancer of the bowel. But they’re not high profile.

Bowels aren`t sexy. The gastric system is not attractive. That area of medicine does not attract a lot of attention. It should. People do not only get bowel cancer, they get other deeply unpleasant and miserable illnesses which are not usually life-threatening but my goodness, they are life-blighting.

And whereas it is fine to talk about having breast cancer, to write blogs and books about it full of black humour, to go to the media if you are a celebrity breast-cancer sufferer, people just don`t want to hear about bowels, thanks very much.

If you want to give some money to help research into the Cinderella areas of medicine, a good friend of mine , who is a consultant gastro-enterologist, is running the New York marathon soon, in aid of the Colitis and Crohn’s Disease Association. Colitis and Crohn’s are dreadful, debilitating diseases which often strike the young and they ruin the quality of life – but that life goes on. And on. And on The money is not only for more research but to help people with these illnesses as they battle through their daily lives.

If you can spare a fiver, or even more, please cheer Dr Sean Weaver on with his race and his fundraising: www.justgiving.com/seanweaver

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Jez

October 29th, 2009 8:56am Report this comment

My Dad's been through a roller coaster for 36 months now.

He had throat cancer before that but then postrate cancer and it's spread.

The most recent has been the last 21 days.

Three Saturday's ago my Mum and I drove him to 'Jimmy's' (St James' Hospital, Leeds) middle of the night, thinking this was the big one- but yet again he fought back along with the proffessional care of the specialist unit / staff there. (although he could have done with a douvet earlier on and his initial reaction to his dosage of morphene sent him 'off on one'; One of the Nurses coming to work on the Monday after his entry to Hospital passed him in the Car-Park at 8.30am in the morning. He had his dressing gown on and was still plugged into one of those drip-stand things. When asked where he was going he replied, very disorientated; "I'm going home. F*** off!" He was trying to escape! What a lad!)

Once security got him back into the Hospital (!) and he started to get some steady treatment he's really improved.

My Dad is back home now (with a Macmillan Nurse) but is firmly back on planet earth, enjoying Sky Sports and a little tipple of 'Famous Grouse' (or three!), just around the corner from his family and more importantly, his Gran-kids.

NuLab may have carried out some outragous actions this past decade but the consultant that was treating my Dad told us (when he was in hospital) that the Labour government had invested and funded heavily in Cancer treatment / care.

He's not going to lie.

So for the record, i'd like to thank them for that.

That's it really.

I hope you raise some good money, Susan for this.

I give a Fiver a month to cancer research (have done since my Dad got Throat Cancer).

All the best.

HFC

October 29th, 2009 11:43am Report this comment

As a doctor said shortly after I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) nearly twenty years ago; 'That's rotten luck, if it was cancer you'd be getting a lot of attention from now on.'

How true.

Sam ARMSTRONG

October 29th, 2009 1:57pm Report this comment

People don't like testicles either Susan. They actually don't find this one unsexy, they find it funny! And yet caner of this area is according to some the biggest killer of young men.

My stepfather went through a terminal brain tumour this year and to be honest the whole cancer industry, from diagnosis right through to death, is not fit for purpose. Wrong drugs prescribed, social workers bitching and texting while the patient lies naked ready for a wash. Unemotional, robotic doctors who deliver bad news with utmost glee. Scans not taken properly. And a complete totalitarian advice to steer clear of alternative remedies. As far as the NHS is concerned, you spot the cancer, then you try and cut it out, then you try and poison it and burn it. If none of that works, then the patient is just expected to die quietly.

Paul B

October 29th, 2009 6:09pm Report this comment

Couldn`t agree more Susan. As a survivor of (Testicular) cancer for over 10 years I have noted with a degree of envy the high profile women's (breast) cancer enjoys with men's cancers hardly ever mentioned. I believe in November there is a drive on to promote awareness of Prostrate Cancer, which is a cancer that affects men and I think far more should be done to raise aware of testicular in young men, which if diagnosed early is very treatable, but like all cancers will kill if not treated.

PS - The wonderful Sir Bobby Moore was a bowel cancer victim and his widow runs an excellent little charity to fund research into the disease. Bobby Moore died aged 51

Jez

October 30th, 2009 7:23pm Report this comment

Hi Sam,

Although contradicting slightly my origional statement regarding the level of care my Dad's recieving now, i can quite agree (hopefully not coming across too hypocritically) with your conclusion regarding some of the treatment he recieved in the past.

My Dad's health started to deteriorate steadily and there was quite a fluid situation with diagnosis. Then a local doctor gave him a near lethal dosage of Morphine because (my opinion) he didn't do his height/weight per amount of Morphine equation correctly. He was rushed to hospital, they sorted him out (to a certain extent) and then set up treatment. It was a Wednesday, 07.30am and i was working in Maryport. He was in the other Leeds hospital so i thought i'd ring him before my shift on site. He was complaining of being very cold- which i thought was strange. I quickly ended the conversation (on the phone by his bedside) immediatley re-rang the hospital switchboard and asked to be put through the the nurses station, explaining he needed checking fast.

We found this out later;

They had started (is it 'radon'?) treatment at the base of his spine, missed and perferated his bowl. Not noticing they'd done this, he slowly was being poisoned. I'd like to say they caught it in time but they actaully gave him the last rites practically. They said they could 'leave him to go peacefully' but 'as a matter of course' but *if* we wanted (like we wouldn't!) they could try and operate.. but in their eyes it would be a foregone conclusion that it was over.

The surgeon saved his life.

They had to perform a colostomy but it saved him.

He's a fighter and so is my Mum.

Never say never guys.

My family and I are all going around tomorow with the children dressed up for Halloween- should be a corker!

Have a good one you lot.

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