The presence of cancer cannot be verified except by biopsy, a microscopic look at cancerous cells taken from the suspicious tumor. Any opinions prior to that analysis are merely suppositions. To collect a sample tissue from a tumor on my liver, the procedure applied was an “UltraSound guided needle biopsy,” a minimally invasive surgical procedure, conducted in early November, 2006.
The surgeon introduced himself, and, not waiting for my response, leapt into legally required disclosures for which I had already signed an agreement printed in three point type. First item he mentioned was that the procedure he was about to perform could result in my death. He then recited a lengthy list of successively less dire possibilities until he ran out of doom and gloom.
With a considerably subdued patient and having finished his legal duty to the hospital and his practice, he brought my insides into focus on the monitor. How many of us get a chance to see our insides while they are functioning? I wasn’t going to miss this show especially since the surgeon had pointed out that I might not survive, so I declined a sedative.
Surgeon, pathologist, nurse anesthetist, and UltraSound technician, each armed with specialized equipment, squeezed around me in a closet-sized room. We watched the careful progress of the needle through my skin, into my liver and positioned to suck up a tissue sample from the tumor. The surgeon passed the first extraction over to the pathologist for approval. Thumbs down; a second pass at my liver produced a sample that satisfied him.
Next: segue to treatment.
Copyright 2008
www.lindalater.blogspot.com
Posted August 30, 2008
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