Every year on January 20, I remind you to schedule all your medical appointments for the year. Preventative care works to help you avoid more severe medical consequences.
This past year, two close friends received the kind of diagnoses we don’t like to hear about. While the affected area was the same part of the body, they had very different pasts and, as a result, very different experiences.
One suffered a lot and had to undergo radiation and chemo. The intensity of daily treatments disrupted her life with long hours in the car and hospital. She received her diagnosis—especially alarming with its grim prognosis—after months of suffering and self-treatment and after years of neglecting preventative care visits. Her treatment regimen was months of daily appointments and will include intense follow-up. She has been flat-out lucky that the treatment worked so well.
The other went to her annual appointment and was advised that they found abnormalities. She went home for a couple of weeks of treatment and returned to continue her travel and work activities with limited impact. Obviously her doctors will continue to monitor her, but she is doing really well.
Both of them are similar in age and both have children who are friends with mine. I wish both of them well in their recovery and pray for their continued good health.
One of them just had a much easier time of it than the other, and it all stems from consistent preventative care.
It’s been eight years now since my father passed. Not a day goes by that I don’t wish I could call him up to hear his voice the way it was before he got sick. I watched him waste and wither away, all the vibrance, intelligence, and good humor that made him so special. It haunts me, and I expect it always will.
Colon cancer can be prevented with regular colonoscopies, which are (to my knowledge) the only procedure known to actually prevent cancer. If he’d just gone and done it, maybe he’d still be here today and we wouldn’t be trying to tell his grandchildren about who he was. They’d have gotten to know him for themselves.
On another personal note, I’ve already gotten a follow-up for a regular preventive medical appointment scheduled for later this month. They need me to come back in and have called me twice in as many days(!) because obviously that doesn’t make a person panic. Snort. But they’ve reassured me the follow-up is relatively common and I needn’t panic quite yet. I’ll take their word for it, as they promise I’ll have the results before I leave the appointment. Anyway, I’ll post an update on whatever they do or don’t find.
Preventative care works. Schedule your appointments in January. Find new providers if necessary. Jump through the insurance hoops. Google for the many free or low-cost clinics that provide the care you need. Just don’t make excuses for yourself. All of us who care about you will be grateful that you did the right thing.