Monthly Archives: May 2014

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The Wisdom of Experience

Sometimes, I feel like a fake. I suppose the ability to see oneself from various angles is a gift of age, but I rather enjoyed myself more when I was sure of who I was –or at least didn’t trouble myself with the question. And yet, to dig for the core is to taste the apple on the way.

It was easy to be a doctor when, primed with knowledge, experience was something displayed in a shop window, not something I wore. It was an outfit I didn’t need -an extravagance, really: a luxury you only donned when the facts you’d learned were threadbare and outdated. It was a costume of authority, a camouflage for waning certitude: Moira.

And yet as I plough through the years as steadily as a man walking through waist-high water, I have come to realize that experience is more than subterfuge, more than mere artifice; it is Age. Nothing less. And following in its wake is all the jetsam tossed overboard to lighten the journey, all the flotsam through which we, as sentient beings, must wade in order to progress. A dirty passage protected only by the hull of maturity. But enough metaphor.

All of this somewhat depressing prologue is to introduce an incident that occurred a few years ago when I was teaching a medical student in my office. Stephanie was very good, really –very perceptive and knowledgeable- and she carried herself like someone who had already graduated. It was not hard to integrate her into the chaotic machinations of my busy office.

We were seeing a woman sent to me from a well-respected family doctor who sometimes attracted patients with very dissimilar world-views. She had come to see me for a second opinion about the management of her menopausal symptoms. Or rather, she had been sent to see me by the GP when she refused to accept the treatment offered by the first specialist.

A very well-dressed woman with neatly brushed hair, she sat across the desk from me looking quite confident. She smiled at Stephanie, and then straightened her shoulders and stared at me defiantly. “My doctor wanted me to see you about the menopause…”

I smiled and waited, pen poised to write down her complaints so I could address them later, but she sat back in her chair, obviously finished, and stared at the calendar hanging on the wall behind me. “So, are you having any problems?” I asked after a rather awkward silence.

She shook her head and shrugged. “Am I supposed to?”

I glanced at Stephanie, who was sitting on the edge of her seat, fascinated at the exchange. “No…” I said, looking at the referral letter that just said ‘MENOPAUSE!’ in giant capital letters followed by an even bigger exclamation mark. “But I rather thought your doctor must have had some reason to send you to see me.”

The woman smiled –at least, I suppose that’s what she wanted me to think, but actually it was a smirk. “I’m managing my menopause very well, doctor…” It was a challenge: a dare to be contradicted.

“So… there are at least some symptoms you’re feeling a need to manage.” I said this carefully, not wanting to provoke her.

She immediately straightened in her chair and her eyes hardened. “Why would you say that?”

My turn to shrug. “Well, is there anything I can do for you, then?” I kept the smile on my face.

She took a deep breath to contain her obvious irritation. “My doctor thinks I should be taking hormones… And so did that other doctor she sent me to.”

I started to write in her chart –it often helps patients to think they are saying something important. “Why is that?” A simple question; no sense confusing her.

Silence, and then a prolonged blink. “I told her I wasn’t sleeping and was becoming irritable at work.” She pinned me to the wall with a sudden glare and then, just as suddenly, relaxed the intensity. A little grin crept onto her lips, but she erased it almost before it flowered. “And I mentioned I was having the occasional hot flush.” Her face hardened. “Why do we always medicalize things and make them into illnesses?”

She was silent for a moment and I put down my pen. She looked at my now dormant chart, for a moment.

“I do not want hormones, doctor,” she said shaking her head angrily. “I’ve solved the issues myself.” And she crossed her arms across her chest as if to ward off any criticism.

I picked up the pen again and her expression softened a little.

“Ginger and lemon juice three times a day…” she said and then stared at me: the dare again.

“It helps?” An innocent question I thought.

“Of course it helps!” Her arms tightened across her chest. “You don’t always need hormones, doctor.”

I tried to keep smiling and sat back in my chair. “I certainly agree with that, Sandra. Sometimes we pathologize things unnecessarily.”

The change in her body language was dramatic and she unfolded her arms and loosened her shoulders. “So you think it’s okay to continue with my lemon and ginger?”

I nodded and wrote something in her chart. “As long as it’s doing the job, why not?” I started to put the pen down and she noticed.

“There’s a lot of stuff in there that you haven’t filled in yet,” she said with an increasing grin on her face and stared at the almost blank history sheet in the chart. “You can ask me some questions –I won’t bite.”

I proceeded with the usual consultation and then looked up at her. She was beaming.

“You’re the first doctor who actually listened to me…” she said, clearly surprised. “Still think I’m okay with the juice?”

I smiled at her -my face was beginning to ache with the effort. “It won’t hurt, “ I said, and sensing she was satisfied with the interview I got up from my chair to open the door for her. “But just let me know if you need to discuss some other options, eh?”

As soon as she was out of the room, Stephanie rolled her eyes; she was obviously troubled.

“So what do you think, Stephanie?”

She took a deep breath and looked at me. “She needs hormones…”

I sat down and waited for her to explain. “I mean, she was obviously describing estrogen withdrawal symptoms: hot flushes, night sweats, sleep disturbance… And did you see how irritable she was? Classic menopausal stuff.”

I smiled patiently. Stephanie was young and enthusiastic. Full of knowledge. “So what would you have done if she’d walked into your office?”

She thought about it for a moment; that she didn’t want to offend me was obvious in her face. “Well… First I would have taken a detailed history like you…” She politely ignored the order in which I had proceeded. “And then I would have told her about how estrogen –and progesterone, I guess, because she still has a uterus- would help alleviate her symptoms.” She looked at me, whether for approval or permission to deviate from my approach I couldn’t tell.

“And if she told you she didn’t want to take hormones? That she felt they were too dangerous, or maybe she didn’t believe she needed them..?”

Stephanie didn’t even blink. “I would have been more insistent…”

“And if she still didn’t agree?”

That stumped her for a moment. “Well… uhmm, maybe I would have sent her to a specialist for another opinion.”

“To validate your opinion, you mean?” I said it lightly and with a grin to defuse the tension I could feel increasing in Stephanie. “She already saw another specialist, who validated her GP’s view… Now what? Give up on her?”

Stephanie stared at me, but it was clear she didn’t have an answer.

“Look,” I started, gently, carefully, so as not to appear to contradict what we both knew to be true: many menopausal symptoms are related to hormonal changes and many of the symptoms do disappear when you prescribe hormones. “Why was she sent to me?”

Stephanie rolled her eyes again –an annoying habit she was prone to use at the slightest provocation. “To treat her menopause…”

“Didn’t she tell us at the very beginning that she was already managing her menopause?”

“Yes, but…”

“Yes, but not the way you would like?”

I could see that Stephanie was becoming exasperated. “But surely you could see that she wasn’t. I mean, she was obviously really irritable and…”

“Wouldn’t you be irritable if nobody listened to your opinion?”

Stephanie’s left eyebrow suddenly took over half her forehead –another trait I had noticed during her time in the office. “But there’s no data on ginger and lemon juice. No studies…”

“She seems to think it’s helping her.”

“Yes, but that’s just a placebo effect. It’s going to wear off…”

I broadened my smile. “And when it does –if it does- who will she decide to talk to about it? The doctors who were unwilling to accept her approach, or the one who admitted she had the right to try another way?”

I’m not sure I convinced young Stephanie, and I’m certain that she’ll succeed in whatever field of Medicine she chooses. But I do hope that she learns that the paths we need to follow are not always straight and that even detours usually end up where we want…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Should IVF be denied to Obese Women?

Obesity has a long and chequered history. Different cultures have both defined it and viewed it differently: in some it was a sign of wealth and was seen as desirable; in others, a sign of weakness, dysfunction, sloth. I use the past tense advisedly, given the rise of fast food outlets throughout the world and their putative role in the rise of obesity in all social strata. Adiposity wears different clothes today.

The classification of weight is now largely dependent on measurement of the Body Mass Index (BMI) -(calculated by dividing the person’s mass -weight- in kilograms, by the square of their height in meters. i.e. M/H x H). In North America, at least, ‘Normal’ weight is less than 25; Overweight is 25-30; Obese is greater than 30. The levels assigned for each category are somewhat arbitrary, however, and various countries -perhaps reflecting differences in diet, genetics, or their own studies- have defined them quite differently.

Obesity, then, is a chimera -a culturally enhanced improvisation; there is little argument about the extremes, but much debate in the middle ground, and therefore about the value at which to begin an intervention -and the resultant stigmatization- if it is solely on the basis of BMI. Not all large people are unhealthy, and neither hypertension nor diabetes, for example, are restricted to that population. So, to base important judgements -with their attendant far-reaching effects- on the measurement of BMI alone is more of a societal bias, a cultural bigotry, than a well-founded and scientifically validated decision.

I am not arguing that excess weight is healthy -or even desirable- but suggesting that to justify treatment decisions on BMI alone risks applying generalizations that are useful when dealing with large populations, but inadequate when considering individuals. No one of us is the herd. And the distinction is an important one.

For example, there seems to be a constantly-shifting move afoot to deny fertility treatments -especially in vitro fertilization (IVF)- to obese women.  Canadian MDs consider denying fertility treatments to obese women   It is based, apparently, on several factors: success rates tend to be lower in this group; the procedure is technically more challenging, and the woman is more likely to suffer complications in the pregnancy that may jeopardize both her and the foetus. The fact that in some jurisdictions, the first one or two treatments may be covered by a government subsidy, suggests that there might also be a feeling that the taxpayer’s money could be better spent on projects more likely to succeed. Or perhaps on issues that benefit more of the electorate.

I have to admit I am conflicted in this. One likes to hope that funds -be they private or public- will be well spent. That there is a reasonable likelihood of success. That the risk/benefit ratio is weighted in favor of the funder. And if this is not the case, then it should be made perfectly clear at the start; the outlook honestly explained, lest expectations trump reality.  http://www.creatingafamily.org/blog/obese-women-banned-vitro-fertilization/

But hope is often unquenchable no matter the argument, so what is an infertility clinic to do? Obviously there have to be some standards for IVF. BMI may well be one of them, but as I have suggested, this is likely only a rough guide to success and seems to have discriminatory overtones, no matter the data.

In medical ethics, decisions are often guided by a few simple principles: Autonomy -the right of an individual to make an informed decision; Beneficence -promoting the health and well-being of others and attempting to serve their best interests; and Non-Maleficence -not intentionally doing them harm (primum non nocere). It is the last of these that seems the most problematic for the IVF clinics. Should they knowingly embark upon a treatment -an elective treatment at that- which may have adverse consequences for their patient? The argument has been raised that doctors don’t apply the same values with respect to dealing with, say, smokers or alcoholics that they do with obese infertile women -all of whose problems are often considered to be self-inflicted, at least by society at large. The argument, of course is specious: the condition of infertility, however unfortunate, is not comparable with emphysema, lung cancer, or liver failure…

I think that a more reasonable approach would be to divide the risks both to the obese woman and her foetus into what I will term heedless risk and assimilable risk. It would be irresponsible, for example, to consider IVF in an older woman, obese or not, with severe, unstable and longstanding insulin-requiring diabetes with hypertension and end stage renal failure -the risks are far too great and the outcome unpredictable at best. Contrast that with a large woman -otherwise healthy- whose only risk is her weight. Yes, there may be technical challenges for the IVF, and each of these would need to be assessed on its own merit and risk; and yes, obese women do have a higher likelihood of pregnancy complications, but so do normal weight women who have, say, pre-existing hypertension, or SLE (lupus). And what about obese women who have become pregnant on their own? We struggle through pregnancies with them…

So I suppose the issue is not so much the risk as the guilt of complicity. The sin of acquiescence: collusion with the woman’s dreams of having a baby. Of actively fostering it. Stepping out of the role of omniscient parent and into the character of enabler. But to see it this way, is to be blind to the other equally important, and yet often forgotten ethical principle: Autonomy. If the risk is assimilable, does the patient not have the right to participate in the decision? Is this not also a requirement of that third principle, Beneficence: serving what she perceives to be in her best interest?

It’s a difficult issue, to be sure, and there’s likely no algorithmically valid approach to its resolution. But in the end, we’re humans, not flow charts -our minds simply do not function well that way. Decisions are not unidimensional, because we are not. Let judgements be based not on the letter of the textbooks, not on the litany of complications, nor on the statistical analyses of non-players, non-actors in the drama. As with the Law, let us consider the spirit in which it was written; details are important, but so are people. Even if they happen to be obese.

 

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The Human Microbiome

 

 

I have always been excited by a new paradigm. Captivated by its novelty. Intrigued by the realization that what we had previously considered to be self evident and true was not sacrosanct. Immutable. Of course I have to confess that it is often the perspective that interests me: that it sometimes okay to question the consensual adherence to a theory -to question what we have all come to believe is correct. To re-interpret the data.  Consensus establishes nothing; it only demonstrates that that we have been swayed by it. It merely lionizes a viewpoint; it does not validate it. And yet that’s Science: always open to refutation, reassessment. Change. According to Karl Popper -the great philosopher of science- a theory should only be considered scientific if it allows the possibility of being proven false.

I’ve just read a fascinating new book on the microbiome (microbiological contents) of the gut and its influence on our health (Missing Microbes, by Dr. Martin Blaser). Admittedly it’s a topic that is all the rage nowadays, but its previous neglect seems, in retrospect, to defy belief. Of course, since the Germ Theory was proposed in the mid sixteenth century, and since microbes were first observed by Anton Van Leeuwenhoek through his primitive microscope the following century, we have been at odds with them, to say the least. They seemed to be hostile to us. Alien. Their presence caused diseases, suffering, and death. We called them germs. That they could be other than enemies was inconceivable. The only good germ was a dead germ; it was obviously in our best interest to eliminate them. All of them…

And yet if they are so menacing, so evil,  why do our bodies tolerate such a large number of them? Seventy to ninety percent of all the cells in our bodies are not ours -an estimated 100 trillion enemy soldiers hidden in a Trojan horse. And inside our gates… If microbes are bad, why is our large bowel packed with them? Why would we carry around our own sources of disease? How could evolution be so stupid?

It seems blindingly obvious, in retrospect, that they must help us in some fashion. And indeed, the bowel micro-organisms are now being increasingly recognized as extremely useful; so useful in fact that one might be well advised to consider them to be another organ –as important for our health as the liver or the kidneys. It’s becoming clear that they seem to serve as co-directors of many bodily processes – immune functions most importantly perhaps, but also for digestion and production of important nutrients, suppressors of other less-friendly bacterial and viral invaders, and even regulators of energy resources -changes in gut flora may be important in obesity and diabetes, for example. We’re only beginning to understand what role they play in our health, and how altering them can alter us.

But I’m an obstetrician, un accoucheur; I deliver babies; I take care of moms and their foetuses through their pregnancies. I lay no claim to much bacteriological expertise, let alone a privileged view of its cutting edges. But as I mentioned, I was absolutely fascinated by Dr. Blaser’s book -especially the chapters about how we get the first dose of bacteria in our bowels, and how the method of delivery might alter that for good or ill. Obviously at this stage, much of this is speculation -interesting, but as yet largely unproven. But think about it: foetuses in the womb are pretty well bacteria free before they are born. They acquire bacteria only after (or during) birth. On their way down their mother’s vagina they acquire their first micro-organisms: they swallow the lactobacilli which dominate the vaginal bacteria. This helps the baby to break down lactose -the major sugar in its mother’s milk. And given the proximity of the vagina to the anus, the baby also gets its first dose of bowel bacteria -the area is not clean no matter how hard we pretend.

So what happens to the baby’s bowel flora if it never passes through the vagina and is delivered instead by Caesarian Section? Is it different? Is it deficient? And if so, does this have any long lasting effects -either good or bad? I mean, the babies seem to turn out okay…

And what about the customary prophylactic dose of antibiotics that are given preoperatively to prevent maternal infection, or the penicillin (or other antibiotic substitute) that is given to mothers who are intending to have a normal vaginal birth but are positive for Group B Streptococcus (GBS) and in labour? Some of this enters the baby, too; does it alter their bowel bacteria? Is this bad, or do the bacteria recover eventually? Does the interim bacterial alteration, come at a crucial time in the immature but rapidly developing immune system just as the baby is learning to adapt to life and its challenges outside the womb?

The difference is obviously an area that needs more study, but some of the early data are truly intriguing. Researchers have even wondered whether the mode of delivery may alter conditions in the growing child -but later (and so less easily attributable to method of delivery). Things such as asthma, or allergies are exaggerated immune responses -maybe ones not dampened by early modulation by the microbiome. And inflammatory bowel disease, autoimmune dysfunction, and even diabetes may be types of genetic epiphenomena -existing genes turned on or off, dimmed or augmented- altered from an early age and possibly -maybe probably- influenced by the bacteria in the gut …

So, am I recommending we stop doing Caesarian Sections? Stop giving antibiotics? Stop wiping off babies to dry them and help their thermoregulation but also -almost a bonus- to clean them after delivery? Should we abandon all that we’ve accomplished, all that we’ve learned in the last 50 years? No, of course not. But sometimes there are options. Choices. If nothing else, it behooves us to discuss these issues with our patients  -early in their pregnancies, preferably, so that rational conversations, untainted by fear and stress, can provoke dialogue and exploration. There are consequences to every decision. So if an elective Caesarian section is chosen for reasons other than absolute necessity we -patient and doctor- must be apprised of the risks -even the potential, unproven risks of suboptimal microbiomal acquisition…

We are naturally engrossed in the prevailing paradigms -they have served us well and reduced mortality rates; we no longer fear death each time we fall ill. But we have entered an age when an increasing cohort of bacteria are becoming resistant to even the most powerful antibiotics. We need a different appreciation of micro-organisms -a paradigm shift- one that acknowledges that not all of them are malevolent; one that appreciates that they probably do more for us than they do to us. An approach that acknowledges there are far more of them than us and so we should try to use their strength to our advantage. It seems to me that, as members of the current paradigm flock, we’ve almost exhausted the meadow where we’ve successfully grazed for such a long time; we have been so happy with the pasture, so complacently wandering with the herd that we didn’t even notice a gate in the fence to an area where the grass is truly greener and more abundant.

We progress incrementally, but only when our minds are open to new ideas. New perspectives. Truth, it seems, is ever changing, and not always what we want it to be. It can be messy and unbelievable at first -uncomfortable even. But as Einstein once remarked: If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the tailor.

 

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Performance Anxiety

I have recently developed performance anxiety -no, not the wide-eyed, heart-thumping, late night Viagra-requiring variety… although that does sound interesting. And not the more artistic type you would expect to get while standing behind the curtain backstage before walking into the spotlight to the expectant applause of a full theater. I don’t have that kind of talent. And anyway my more immediate concern there would be tripping. No, it’s far more… digital than that. Perhaps I should explain.

Ever since my days as a high school nerd, pocket protectors have epitomized my calling. True to the role, I tried to stay at the cutting edge of social ineptitude, but as I aged and morphed into an adult, I became aware that the plastic protector pouch looked silly and that, like a tail,  carrying too many pens was vestigial. The age of the nerd was ending and there seemed no one but me around who was at all nostalgic for it. It had become anomalous -a quaint but naive time in a world that had evolved beyond it.

I was able to keep up with the social awkwardness, however, thanks to my annoying habit of not watching sufficient TV to be able to talk sports at the parties to which I’m no longer invited, or by not using the latest slang expression properly -if at all- at work. I still can’t bring myself to say “No worries,” if someone bumps into me, and am more likely to excuse myself for being in their way. I have trouble knowing how to respond to a ‘high five’ gesture, and when introduced to someone new, have an amazing penchant for immediately garbling her name and then promptly forgetting it.

So it was with high hopes that I felt I would be riding a new and different wave with the Electronic Medical Records system I was reluctantly forced to install in my office. In spite of my hesitation, I felt I was about to reincarnate into Geek, the twenty-first century equivalent of my high school name.  I loved the word and immediately tried to parse it.

I have been writing for years on a computer, so I didn’t anticipate any problems with the transition. I do have to admit to a certain nostalgia for paper, though; crumpling it when you make a mistake is one of Life’s irreplaceable pleasures. Even the subsequent necessity of throwing it into some sort of receptacle -and hitting the target- is a form of release. A silent Cognitive Behaviour Therapy.

But I very much suspected that not having something to shuffle in front of me, to rumple up or underline with emphasis, not being able to free-hand a diagram with curved lines and arrows and otherwise describe difficult and obscure anatomical features in full view of a curious patient would prove disappointing. Nerds -extinct or not- have always been complex integrators -visual as well as cerebral. We didn’t just carry all those different coloured pens around for show. We used them -all of them- on different occasions, each with a purpose, like actors in a play.

And indeed, writing, drawing, and underlining while the written-about watched was part of the show. Part of the interactive play. By changing pens, or circling something scribbled on the paper, the person across the desk knew she had said something important. Something helpful. It encouraged her to continue, often with details she would not otherwise have supplied. And it’s a full eye contact game: the nodding head, the subtle but respectful smile, the slow reach for a lab requisition -all signs to the patient that she has succeeded in conveying her concerns. All boding well for an auspicious climax for the interview.

I had difficulty imagining that the clack -or lack of clack- of my fingers on the keys would elicit the same response. Somehow, restricting my interactions to a screen that only I can view seemed anathema to the relationship I was trying to foster. Since everything is printed and filled out in the secret bowels of the computer, there would be no moment of hesitation and then deliberate reaching for different coloured forms -each one invested with authority; no more wide-eyed admiration for the amount of  information I had been able to extract that she could see in her shared view of the chart from across the desk; and no more wonder at the ability of doctors to read their own handwriting -all part of the magic and method that is Medicine.

But when the moment came to transform the interaction from the smooth hiss of a pencil drawing a diagram, from the silent mating of pen on paper, from the sweeping elegance of an encircled thought, or an underlined, obviously critical datum -from, in other words, personal to digital- an unexpected problem arose. Something I could not have anticipated. Something not all the preparation, all the latest technology, nor all my previous experience with computers would have suggested: I simply could not type with another set of eyes staring at my fingers. I could feel the criticism with every pause to check the keys, the judgement whenever I slowed down, the silent mirth in her eyes whenever I chanced a look in her direction and made a mistake… And the more I thought about it, the clumsier I became. I typed like someone wearing gloves. I kept flashing back to the piano lessons I had as a child when I first discovered, to my shame, that I was distressingly ametronomic.

My older patients seemed to understand -I don’t think they even noticed my almost stochastic approach to the keyboard. They were too busy searching for my eyes. Feeling my pain. Like they had come to help me. No, it is the young who notice. But they are usually too polite to criticize openly, too amused at the unexpected levelling effect of shattered hubris to do other than smile. It is I who feel discomfited, I who feel I must apologize… And I who inadvertently delete the page trying to recoup my composure. Re-establish my rhythm.

Performance anxiety now has new meaning for me. It is the wave I am riding as I attempt to surf into the new époque. But I am philosophical about it, and I had a thought: could it be keyboard performance and not the other stuff that is really what separates the young from the grey? Something you don’t need a pill for because it improves with time? And hope sprung eternal… The golden age is before us, not behind us –as Shakespeare wrote, probably typing the whole thing without a mistake -assuming no one was watching from across his desk, of course…

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The Cancer We Think We Know…

In those early, once-upon-a-time days when I thought I knew everything and before humility had forced itself upon my stage, a haggard middle aged woman named Mary walked into my office a week early for her appointment. It was in the young days of my career and as it happened, a patient who was scheduled for that time had not shown up. So, I agreed to see her.

She had a wild look in her eyes, and they immediately pinned me to my side of the desk. Well-groomed despite her jeans and tattered grey sweatshirt she could have been mistaken for someone ten years her junior. But she had been referred by a family doctor that I, of decidedly conventional western medical training, had come to associate with fringe issues -homeopathy, hair analyses, colonic cleansing and the like- so I prepared myself for sifting through a ream of details I could not hope to understand.

“I don’t feel well, doctor,” she started, her voice as serious and worried as her face. “I’m 41 and for the last six months I’ve had a constant ache in my lower abdomen on the left side -my pelvis, actually. My periods are light, non-painful, and as regular as a calendar with no intermenstrual spotting; I have never had any pregnancies, operations or illnesses. I’m not on any medications, don’t smoke, and have no allergies. In fact, you’re the first specialist I’ve ever been referred to.” She managed a brief smile. “I had my family doctor order an ultrasound 4 or 5 months ago months and it showed a thin, normal appearing endometrial lining of the uterine cavity, but a 4 cm. complex cyst on the left ovary. A repeat ultrasound last month found it was still there, albeit somewhat smaller.” She hesitated briefly and then added: “I’ve had this kind of cyst before but usually without symptoms, and the cyst is always  gone by my next scan.” She looked at me for a moment and finally said, “So now I’m worried, of course.”

I have to admit I was a bit taken aback that she’d already answered most of the questions I had intended to ask, so I just sighed when she appeared to have finished her summary. “You seem to know your way around medical words…”

A smile appeared briefly on her lips, but one that couldn’t disguise her anxiety. “I have a PhD in pharmacology and am doing some research at the Cancer Agency so I guess I’ve picked up a few words…” She was sitting bolt upright in her seat, but the expression on her face said she wasn’t finished so I waited for her to speak. And anyway, I was running out of questions to ask.

“I’d like you to take everything out,” she said, suddenly leaning forward over the desk.

“Meaning..?”

“Meaning uterus, tubes, ovaries… everything!” She took a deep breath. “Look, I’m really afraid that all these cysts I’ve been getting on my ovaries are telling me something. There’s not a shred of cancer in the family, but I have this feeling about my ovaries that I can’t explain: I know  there’s cancer in one of them. Don’t ask me how I know it -I just do. And it’s only a matter of time before it becomes obvious in one of the ultrasounds… maybe too much time.

“I don’t want any kids; I’m not in a relationship; and I’m willing take hormones…” She blinked. “But I can’t take cancer.”

I’d been writing all this in her chart, but I put down my pen and looked at her. “Do you mind if I examine you and then we can talk about it?”

She agreed with a shrug of her shoulders. “Okay, but don’t tell me the recurrent cysts are just the result of anovulation…”

I had to smile at that one: it was precisely what I had intended to tell her. Anyway, I couldn’t feel the cyst and I told her so when we returned to the office after the examination. She seemed surprised.

“Are you sure? I mean I’m not questioning your findings, but why would it just disappear when it was still there last month? And a complex cyst as well,” she added, obviously aware of the possible ramifications implied by the term and searching my face for answers.

“Would you mind if I repeated the ultrasound?” I could see my findings had not reduced her concern in the slightest. “And maybe I’ll order some tumour markers, just in…”

“They’re usually not very helpful at my age.” The words seemed to escape her mouth before she could stop them, so she plastered an embarrassed smile over her lips. But she did agree to the repeat ultrasound.

*

I’m afraid I forgot about her until she returned a couple of weeks later, after the ultrasound.

“Well, it was normal,” I said as soon as she sat down. “But I suspect you already know that.”

She nodded. “I still want you to operate, though.”

I sighed, looked at the ultrasound report again and then at my notes in her chart. “But that left ovary is completely normal in appearance now -both of them are. The uterus looks normal… everything  looks normal.” I riffled through the few lab tests I’d managed to convince her to take. “Your periods are normal, so I admit that it makes non-ovulation as a cause for the cysts less likely, but the tumour markers are normal, the…” I glanced at her face. “No, I’m not putting too much reliance on them, but at least they’re reassuring as well.” I could see her fidgeting in her chair all the while staring at me. “Look, I can’t just take everything out in a woman your age without some good reason.”

She crossed her arms and a stern expression captured her face.

“So, how about we consider a couple of options?” I suggested, looking her in the eyes. She blinked, and I took that for an agreement. “The first is that we repeat the ultrasound in, say, six months and then…”

She shook her head firmly, and stared at me. “What’s the second option?”

“We get a second opinion -a female gynaecologist, maybe. If she agrees, then maybe she can do the…”

“I chose you, not another doctor,” she said slowly. “If the second doctor -the female– agrees, will you do the operation?”

I have to admit I felt a little flattered by that, and I suppose it’s why I agreed. But by the time she got a reluctant agreement from the other doctor and I was finally able to book the surgery, it was six or seven months later.

I went to see her on the ward the day after the surgery. “Everything went well, Mary. The uterus and tubes appeared normal, and the ovaries were both outstanding-looking citizens.” I don’t know why I said that; I suppose I was trying to make her realize that I was happy with what I’d seen.”

“When will we..?”

“Get the pathology report? It’s probably going to take about a week. But I’m not expecting any surprises, you know,” I said with a smile as I gently squeezed her hand.

But her eyes were wiser than my words. “Now that my ovaries are out, that bad feeling I used to have is gone; you got the cancer. I can tell…” Her voice faded as she closed her eyes and drifted into a narcotic-driven sleep.

*

I called her to come in to the office as soon as I got the report.

“It was cancer all along, wasn’t it?” she said in a soft, worried voice even before she sat down.

I nodded slowly and reached  across my desk for her hand. “But it was in the uterus, not the ovaries…”

Her face softened, and her shoulders relaxed; her response was a statement rather than a question: “That’s a better cancer to have, though, isn’t it?” Then she smiled and squeezed my hand this time.