Okay, so later today I'll visit Lake Health's Tri-Point Medical Center.
Its radiological unit, to be specific. There I'll be injected with a radioactive dye that will take a couple of hours to blitzkrieg through my bone structure.
Then about 1:30 p.m. or so I'll return to the sterile environment, try to remain calm and steady and smiling attendants provide me with instructions on what will happen over the next 60 minutes or so. That's about how long it takes to undergo a complete bone scan.
As explained by my urologist, Dr. Lawrence Wolkoff, what an expert in interpreting this non-TSA-approved scanning gizmo is looking for is any area "that lights up."
Pray that no such illumination appears, please. The reason: Such bright areas indicate that the prostate cancer has spread to my bones, and bones (for whatever and still not understood reason) is where prostate cancer cells go to hide after leaving the walnut-sized organ.
A clear image would point to the cancer being confined to the prostate. That will greatly assist in achieving a 100-percent chance of beating the disease through any number of treatment options.
Those options and the results of today's bone scan will be released to my wife Bev and me on Friday.
Yeah, it seems that with a disease like this it's a constant battle of going to doctors, tests and fighting the urge to eat at fast-food joints between visits.
In any event, one thing that still bugs me is I'm not sure what to call myself.
I don't really consider myself to be a patient yet since I haven't submitted myself to the rigors of a hospital stay. I suppose that most people would say I'm this since I've seeing a physician specialist.
However, I do believe the word "client" is more accurate. No, I don't believe "customer" qualifies either, since that sort of gives the impression that the only reason so many doctors have seen me is so that they can keep up their membership in trophy golf clubs or gas in their Porsches. (Sorry, guys, I couldn't resist).
Maybe the best word to describe my current status is "cancer victim." Yeah, I kind of like that one.
I didn't ask for, nor did I want, to contract cancer. It snuck up on me like a thief in the night while I wasn't looking and distracted by another serious - but not life-threatening - set of physical problems.
So victim it is. For the immediate, anyway.
Sure I'll become a patient when I'm actually receiving treatment but it's still just a short haul down the road.
Ultimately there really is only one term that any prostate cancer victim wants to carry around. That being, "prostate cancer survivor."
- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
JFrischkorn@News-Herald.com
Twiter: @Fieldkorn
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