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My Story- Alan

 
 

Having been through an operation a while ago for prostate cancer I have written a short story of the events that surround this.
Here is my story -

After donating blood regularly for several years, suddenly in Dec 96 my red cell count and blood pressure were found to be low. I donated blood again in March 97 with the same results. The only other symptom that indicated to me that there was anything wrong was that I was constantly getting tired. I put this down to excessive workload as I had a full time job as well as trying to run my own business from home. 

My wife persuaded me to see my G.P. which I did on 14th March. My G.P. gave me a full examination and could not find anything major wrong, and suggested a series of blood tests to see if that would reveal anything. We discussed prostate problems but as I was only 42 years old and had had no 
symptoms in that area it was just about to be washed over, but my G.P. said that a PSA test would rule it out for sure.

The results of the blood tests two days later revealed a PSA of 11.7 . My G.P. then explained that there was a chance of prostate cancer as all the other blood tests returned normal. A DRE by my G.P. confirmed an enlarged prostate. An appointment was made to see a specialist ( Prof. K.Kaye ) of the QE 11 Medical Centre in Perth. Prof. Kaye is the top Urology Surgeon in WA and although "private" he does see some patients under the "public" medical system.


8th May - I saw Prof. Kaye and after another DRE we discussed what tests would be done to confirm that it was cancer and what the options would be after that.

16th May - I had a Trans-rectal biopsy . This was quite painful during and for a while afterwards, but the next day all was fine. I experienced a small amount of blood loss as was expected but this cleared up within 24 hrs. 

21st May - I had a Bone scan. This entailed having an injection of a radioactive isotope that collect around certain tissue to see if the cancer had reached the bone marrow. I was placed on a machine that had a tunnel like part, which was slowly moved up my body taking certain X-ray pictures. After the injection I had to drink lots of water to flush it all out of my system.

28th May - I had a CT Scan. This was similar to the bone scan except that instead of an injection I had to drink a load of this liquid which tasted very much like warm liquorice. Another PSA test on the 29th May showed that my PSA had now reached 18.5.      
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A Day in the Life
"We don't know what it would be like not to have to drive 300 miles on pharmacy trips, fights with medical vendors, etc.; that to us is normal." Read more about Jamie Lamb.
-visit "JamieWorld".
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