If they are doing the alternative of FIT every year (with colonoscopy on a positive result), then it is not like they are doing nothing.
I donât think they are. Iâll find out, gently.
Iâm going to look into that FIT process mentionedâŠ
In my opinion, colonoscopy is a Godsend. Because of my DHâs early cancer, our Ds were advised to get their first one at age 36. But D2, at 28, had a colonoscopy for other reasons. They found 2 PRE-CANCEROUS polyps! Had she waited until 36 for her first screening, who knows what they would have found. Because of D2âs results, D1 (33 years old) was strongly recommended to get screened immediately. She had 4 precancerous polyps. I thank GOD that this procedure exists. Otherwise our family tragedies would probably be really horrible.
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Completely by coincidence, I happened upon a YouTube channel today that documented a womanâs experience with colon cancer. This beautiful young woman and mother of 2 small children was diagnosed Stage 3 at TWENTY FIVE YEARS OLD.
Through surgery, chemo, happy remission and the building of their incredibly beautiful dream home, the woman and her husband deal with this horrible disease with optimism and faith, taking each day as it came. But her cancer returned and this poor young woman went through hell as she fought to beat it. It wasnât to be, and in her husbandâs last video about it, he documented some of the hardships she faced that they hadnât covered in their video stories.
It had me in tears. Seems so incredibly unfair, and just mind boggling that this happened to such a young woman with no apparent early colon cancer cases in her family (at least from what I could gather-I didnât watch all of their videos about it).
So thankful my Ds have a baseline study, know that they are high risk, and have the willingness to stay on top of their follow up colonoscopies.
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@Nrdsb4 : Your daughters are indeed very lucky. No one would want the gene they have nor the frequent colonoscopies, but how wonderful that we have this test that has and will continue to save their lives.
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Also a mini reminder. Check your insurance policies to see if you get any bonuses for getting them done. We have a cancer plan that gives us $75 for getting a colonoscopy screening. Simple claim form to fill out. We also get $$ for mammograms and other screenings.
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Wow thatâs a smart insurance company!
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Recommendation: Colorectal Cancer: Screening | United States Preventive Services Taskforce (figure 1) shows the comparison between various screening methods in terms of life years gained, CRC cases averted, and CRC deaths averted. Yearly FIT does have much lower cost and hassle (including accounting for the colonoscopies that result from positive FIT results) and lower risk of complications of colonoscopy.
Please check with your physician first.
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Thanks usbalamnus!
Yes, Bunsen, will def raise w/Mt doc- was considering as a supplement, would never replace colonoscopy. Thanks!
Iâve recently discovered podcasts and now I really enjoy walking my dog in the woods!! For those who are interested, thereâs a series (about 75 episodes) called Freakonomics, M.D., hosted by a physician and economist Bapu Jena. (Yes, heâs of Indian descent.) Check out #61, titled âShould You Bother Getting a Colonoscopy?â The answer is not definitive, but he has a lot of interesting information.
In fact, IMO you should check out the whole series. I love this sort of stuff.
(I found the series after reading a book, Random Acts of Medicine, by Jena and Worsham. I also recommend that book, but it has nothing to do with colonoscopies.)
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HuhâI would have thought the term Freakonomics was copyrighted by those two economists that wrote the books by that title.
The referred to podcast and transcript is here:
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Here is the recent study being referred to in that podcast, which compares colonoscopy to no screening in a randomized trial:
Thanks for providing the link. This is very helpful and I think that the article is worth reading.
Having read the paper that @ucbalumnus provided a link to, I am still going to go ahead with my next scheduled colonoscopy (which is fortunately nearly 5 years away, since I just had one recently).
One issue is that the study covers 10 years. I am not sure if this is long enough to fully recognize the advantage of removing precancerous polyps. To me it seems like having regular colonoscopies is a long term investment â and not something that is expected to pay off in the next few years. I guess that having one is making a bet that something unrelated is not going to kill us off fast enough to make the colonoscopy unneeded.
Also, in the study there were fewer cases of colorectal cancer among those who had a colonoscopy. The difference looks quite significant to me, although I have not tried to do the math (it has been a while since I studied statistics).
The typical recommended interval in the US is 10 years, so that reflects the risk of cancer occurring in the interval between screening colonoscopies.
Freakonomics MD is a spin-off. The Freakonomics podcast âadvertisedâ it when started.
I had colonoscopy yesterday. 2 small polys, one larger. I will again need to return in 3 years (bummer, but better than annual). The Sutab prep was tolerable, though I did not love getting up 4am to do all the part2 steps prior to my 10am procedure. (I did get to rest about a half hour along the way).
Due to the polyp removals, Iâm supposed to be on low residue diet another 2 weeks. Gonna need to figure out some healthier good choices. Last week I took advantage of the situation to eat foods normally avoided⊠donuts, Stouffer mac/cheese etc.
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Two weeks?? Oh wow.
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Wowâwhen we have had polyps removed ages ago, no special diet afterwards. I guess things have changed! Glad they removed the polyps and hope you have good results in 3 years.