Thursday, April 10, 2008

Back from the Doctor...

Well that was one long wait. I was supposed to be there at 4:30 and I sat in the office until 5:30 waiting to see him. I didn't have an official appointment but he was going to see me at the end of his day, which was fine by me. After what seemed like an eternity, I was able to finally get some one on one time with the doc. He was very patient and answered every one of my questions, no matter how trivial.

He drew pictures for me to illustrate where the biopsies were taken and what was found. For someone my age, my Gleason's score was high, a 7 in one area and a 6 in the other. I came in with a 6.4 PSA level which is what led him to want to perform the biopsy. This was actually my 2nd biopsy. My first was 3 years ago and it was negative. My PSA at the time was a 3.4.

After much discussion and explanation of the various procedures available to me, I settled in with accepting a minimally invasive robotic removal of the complete prostate. It's just really setting in what is about to happen and what I have to look forward to. He feels fairly certain that the cancer is contained within the prostate but is having me have a complete bone scan as well as an MRI of the region to maker sure that there has been no spreading of the beast. Tonight I will spend some time researching a bit more and meditating on what lies before me. The bone scan will be next week and the MRI will be in 4 weeks with the surgery happening a couple of weeks later. I have what is known as T1c Prostate Cancer. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

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