So, I write this blog after the Super Bowl. It was an exciting game, but I must confess to being very suspicious about a team that somehow was able to lose to the Redskins twice during the regular season. Talk about parity … I can’t say I was crazy about the commercials or the halftime show.
Delaying the blog gave me a chance to think about what really affected me most last week — a new patient I saw on Thursday. He is a 31-year-old man,married, with a wife, a small child and another one on the way. Almost unimaginably, he has newly diagnosed metastatic colon cancer, and no family history or antecedent medical problem that suggests he has a known genetic predisposition. There is a small chance that he can be cured with an aggressive blend of chemotherapy and surgery, but this is a very tough situation.
It’s funny how some patients manage to penetrate the semipermeable membrane that protects oncologists from the personal tragedies we witness on a regular basis; I guess he has done so because he is only three weeks older than our oldest son, and I know how exciting it is to be approaching the true fullness of one’s adult life, with a seemingly limitless time horizon stretching ahead. And then, the impossible happens.
If anything can remind me that what we I do as a doctor is important, this young man’s illness will serve. And, if anything can remind me that what we all do — striving to understand, prevent, treat and cure all types of cancer — is very important, this little vignette will do too.
Time to go back to work.