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Thread: Colonoscopy
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21st October 2019, 09:12 AM #1
Colonoscopy
hmmm decisions decisions, should this be in this section, the jokes or health?
friend sent me this it is aged so maybe seen before
Colon (This Dave Barry column was originally published Feb. 22, 2008.)
OK. You turned 50. You know you’re supposed to get a colonoscopy. But you haven’t. Here are your reasons: 1. You’ve been busy.
2. You don’t have a history of cancer in your family. 3. You haven’t noticed any problems. 4. You don’t want a doctor to stick a tube 17,000 feet up your butt.
1997, when I turned 50, everybody told me I should get a colonoscopy. I agreed that I definitely should, but not right away. By following this policy, I reached age 55 without having had a colonoscopy. Then I did something so pathetic and embarrassing that I am frankly ashamed to tell you about it.
If you are as a professional humour writer, and there is a giant colon within a 200-mile radius, you are legally obligated to go see it. So I went to Miami Beach and crawled through the Colossal Colon. I wrote a column about it, making tasteless colon jokes. But I also urged everyone to get a colonoscopy. I even, when I emerged from the Colossal Colon, signed a pledge stating that I would get one.
But I didn’t get one. I was a fraud, a hypocrite, a liar. I was practically a member of Congress.
Five more years passed. I turned 60, and I still hadn’t gotten a colonoscopy. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I got an e-mail from my brother Sam, who is 10 years younger than I am, but more mature. The email was addressed to me and my middle brother,
`Dear Brothers,
``I went in for a routine colonoscopy and got the dreaded diagnosis: cancer. We’re told it’s early and that there is a good prognosis that they can get it all out, so, fingers crossed, knock on wood, and all that. And of course they told me to tell my siblings to get screened. I imagine you both have.’‘
Um. Well.
First I called Sam. He was hopeful, but scared. We talked for a while, and when we hung up, I called my friend Andy Sable, a gastroenterologist, to make an appointment for a colonoscopy. A few days later, in his office, Andy showed me a colour diagram of the colon, a lengthy organ that appears to go all over the place, at one point passing briefly through Minneapolis. Then Andy explained the colonoscopy procedure to me in a thorough, reassuring and patient manner. I nodded thoughtfully, but I didn’t really hear anything he said, because my brain was shrieking, quote, ``HE’S GOING TO STICK A TUBE 17,000 FEET UP YOUR BUTT!’‘
I left Andy’s office with some written instructions, and a prescription for a product called ‘‘MoviPrep,’‘ which comes in a box large enough to hold a microwave oven. I will discuss MoviPrep in detail later; for now suffice it to say that we must never allow it to fall into the hands of America’s enemies.
I spent the next several days productively sitting around being nervous. Then, on the day before my colonoscopy, I began my preparation. In accordance with my instructions, I didn’t eat any solid food that day; all I had was chicken broth, which is basically water, only with less flavor. Then, in the evening, I took the MoviPrep. You mix two packets of powder together in a one-litre plastic jug, then you fill it with lukewarm water. (For those unfamiliar with the metric system, a litre is about 32 gallons.) Then you have to drink the whole jug. This takes about an hour, because MoviPrep tastes -- and here I am being kind -- like a mixture of goat spit and urinal cleanser, with just a hint of lemon.
The instructions for MoviPrep, clearly written by somebody with a great sense of humour, state that after you drink it, ‘‘a loose watery bowel movement may result.’‘ This is kind of like saying that after you jump off your roof, you may experience contact with the ground.
MoviPrep is a nuclear laxative. I don’t want to be too graphic, here, but: Have you ever seen a space shuttle launch? This is pretty much the MoviPrep experience, with you as the shuttle. There are times when you wish the commode had a seat belt. You spend several hours pretty much confined to the bathroom, spurting violently. You eliminate everything. And then, when you figure you must be totally empty, you have to drink another litre of MoviPrep, at which point, as far as I can tell, your bowels travel into the future and start eliminating food that you have not even eaten yet.
After an action-packed evening, I finally got to sleep. The next morning my wife drove me to the clinic. I was very nervous. Not only was I worried about the procedure, but I had been experiencing occasional return bouts of MoviPrep spurtage. I was thinking, ‘‘What if I spurt on Andy?’‘ How do you apologise to a friend for something like that? Flowers would not be enough.
At the clinic I had to sign many forms acknowledging that I understood and totally agreed with whatever the hell the forms said. Then they led me to a room full of other colonoscopy people, where I went inside a little curtained space and took off my clothes and put on one of those hospital garments designed by sadist perverts, the kind that, when you put it on, makes you feel even more naked than when you are actually naked.
Then a nurse named Eddie put a little needle in a vein in my left hand. Ordinarily I would have fainted, but Eddie was very good, and I was already lying down. Eddie also told me that some people put vodka in their MoviPrep. At first I was ticked off that I hadn’t thought of this, but then I pondered what would happen if you got yourself too tipsy to make it to the bathroom, so you were staggering around in full Fire Hose Mode. You would have no choice but to burn your house.
When everything was ready, Eddie wheeled me into the procedure room, where Andy was waiting with a nurse and an anesthesiologist. I did not see the 17,000-foot tube, but I knew Andy had it hidden around there somewhere. I was seriously nervous at this point. Andy had me roll over on my left side, and the anesthesiologist began hooking something up to the needle in my hand. There was music playing in the room, and I realized that the song was Dancing Queen by Abba. I remarked to Andy that, of all the songs that could be playing during this particular procedure, Dancing Queen has to be the least appropriate. ‘’You want me to turn it up?’‘ said Andy, from somewhere behind me.
And then it was time, the moment I had been dreading for more than a decade. If you are squeamish, prepare yourself, because I am going to tell you, in explicit detail, exactly what it was like.
I have no idea. really. I slept through it. One moment, Abba was shrieking ``Dancing Queen! Feel the beat from the tambourine . . .’‘
. . . and the next moment, I was back in the other room, waking up in a very mellow mood. Andy was looking down at me and asking me how I felt. I felt excellent. I felt even more excellent when Andy told me that it was all over, and that my colon had passed with flying colours. I have never been prouder of an internal organ.
But my point is this: In addition to being a pathetic medical weenie, I was a complete moron. For more than a decade I avoided getting a procedure that was, essentially, nothing. There was no pain and, except for the MoviPrep, no discomfort. I was risking my life for nothing.
Which brings us to you, Mr. or Mrs. or Miss or Ms. Over-50-And-Hasn’t-Had-a-Colonoscopy. Here’s the deal: You either have colo-rectal cancer, or you don’t. If you do, a colonoscopy will enable doctors to find it and do something about it. And if you don’t have cancer, believe me, it’s very reassuring to know you don’t. There is no sane reason for you not to have it done.I would love to grow my own food, but I can not find bacon seeds
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21st October 2019, 03:45 PM #2rrich Guest
Yes, I'm 77 and had the pleasure of enduring 5 colonoscopies. With the last one, which is the last one that I'll need, came with a report and PICTURES yes pictures! A thrilling aspect. Copies are available upon request.
Two of the colonoscopies were about 3 weeks apart. I had a polyp and the first doctor says Doctor xyz has developed a procedure to remove the polyp much better than I can. So the second colonoscopy. The message here is to ask if the doctor can remove any polyps. If not, schedule with a doctor that can. You don't want to do it twice.
Of all of the colonoscopies, I only had sedation for one. Never again! SWMBO drove me to and from but I had parked my F-150 about a mile and a half from home. Four traffic lights and only one turn off of the main street into the subdivision. We arrived at my F-150 about 2 hours after the colonoscopy and SWMBO dropped me off. I actually had to THINK about what I was going to do. Push the button on the remote to unlock the door. Open the door. Climb in. Put key in ignition. Why wont the truck go into reverse? Oh, start the truck. I turned off the radio and drove the most terrifying mile and a half to get home.
My advice is to not be sedated. Just tell the doctor to not be aggressive with the air pressure. You will feel cramps but not bad. The first time w/o sedation the anesthetist was there looking at me about 6 inches from my face. I told her that she was scaring the poop out of me. (Not exactly those words but this isn't the bad room.) The doctor told her that she could leave.
The last time I was looking at the monitor that had all of my vital signs. I discovered there was one graph that I could control, my respiration. So as I'm laying there having my dignity destroyed, I tried to make my respiration look like a square wave on the monitor. Finally the doctor says, "Are you doing that?" I said, "Yes I'm trying to make my respiration look like a square wave." He swats me on the rear end and says, "Stop it. You're causing problems with the monitor."
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21st October 2019, 05:35 PM #3
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A friend of mine, when asked to sign the paperwork for a colonoscopy, told them that he knew that they would be shoving a tube up him and taking pictures and that unless they intended showing it on the TV news, he did not see the need for the paperwork.
Tom
"It's good enough" is low aim
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21st October 2019, 07:12 PM #4
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21st October 2019, 07:24 PM #5
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I have had more colonoscopies than I care to think about and they never get better. They gave me the photos about ten years ago and I told them not to waste the film in future and the doctor who has become nearly a personal friend over the last 35 years looked at me as though I was serious about the film but he hasn't bothered since.
CHRIS
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21st October 2019, 08:32 PM #6
Had my first "top 'n' tail" this year, and all clear. Procedure is nothing to worry about, because you're not "there" when it happens, but happily off in the land of nod. The preparation, though, is something else altogether. Picoprep is the medicine of the devil !! Quickest way out there to lose 3kg in the space of a day and a half......
For those who never had the preparation, "Oh, it doesn't seem to be working - nothing is happening?" may be the last thing you say out loud if you're not already sitting on the dunny. DAMHIKT
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21st October 2019, 09:25 PM #7
What happened to Sam?
Cliff.
If you find a post of mine that is missing a pic that you'd like to see, let me know & I'll see if I can find a copy.
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21st October 2019, 09:37 PM #8
Here the government sends you a test kit, but I can never get around to doing it.
I have had two colonoscopies though.
After the first I was bouncing off the walls that night. The following night I taken to emergency and then spent the next seven days in hospital on a drip. So much for a simple day procedure!
For the second, as a precaution I spent the night in hospital but was fine.
Recently my wife had the procedure plus two skin biopsies done at the same time. Like every body above, apart from the clean out prep there is little two worry about.
So far all clear. Yes the surgeon does get to check your head is not there where the sun does not shine, but hey we're all the same.
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21st October 2019, 10:53 PM #9
I'm going to have another one tomorrow. The Prep is working fine.
I am learning, slowley.
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22nd October 2019, 05:00 PM #10
I’ve had a few and the first one they picked up that I had reflux.
Problem was they didn’t ring my wife to come and pick me up for an hour and in the meantime they told me about the reflux.
I was still off with the fairies and didn’t do any thing about the reflux for years until it took me Half an hour to eat a five minute meal.
I was immediately on double the dose than if they had given us a written report instead of telling me.
Make sure someone is there to pick you up and comprehend what’s going on.
A mate of mine has his and then walks a few k home, still Gaga but not markedly more than normal for him.
H.Jimcracks for the rich and/or wealthy. (aka GKB '88)
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22nd October 2019, 08:01 PM #11
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15th November 2019, 11:57 AM #12
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Came late to this “discussion”.
Seriously, I fully support the above responses as to the necessity of having this procedure, regularly.
WELCOME TO OLD AGE! Regard this as necessary maintenance to keep you alive and ensuring you get to an older age.
As stated above, the procedure itself is negligible, the prep stuff on the other hand is a whole new story. It’s a great musical cue...... Johnny Cash’s famous song takes on a whole new meaning.
YouTubeRegards,
Bob
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
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15th November 2019, 01:06 PM #13
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15th November 2019, 05:20 PM #14But you haven’t. Here are your reasons: 1. You’ve been busy.
2. You don’t have a history of cancer in your family. 3. You haven’t noticed any problems. 4. You don’t want a doctor to stick a tube 17,000 feet up your butt.
I've done a few, as well as the nice envelope kit sent by our government (sent it back with my tax return). Fortunately, all well so far ... touch wood (a good reason to be in the workshop?). Stay well my friends.
Regards from Perth
DerekVisit www.inthewoodshop.com for tutorials on constructing handtools, handtool reviews, and my trials and tribulations with furniture builds.
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