Friday, November 1, 2013

Thoughts on colonoscopy, homage to one of the greatest researchers, Marie Curie, and the colossal mistake the U.S. federal government is making in reducing the funding that improves life and enhances our planet day by day, discovery by discovery.



by Dr. Jeffrey Lant.

 Author's program note. It is 5:27 a.m. here in Cambridge, where the invention of  the future via research is our product, our pride, our unmitigated purpose...  a place  of assiduous effort, often lonely, frequently inconclusive, a place where the glory  lies not just in achieving a goal but in knowing this achievement will be overtaken by  others who will thereby advance truth and progress by using the fruit of every  prior effort and exertion, just as those following them will advance beyond  everything and everyone which came before, no matter how celebrated or  useful in its time.

 "If I have seen farther," Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) famously said, "it is  because I have stood on the shoulders of giants." In that single phrase lies the  reason why Cambridge and all its myriad educational institutions exists and why  we must assist and not diminish them, for their work is vital,  necessary, where  the collective brain power and untiring effort move us appreciably, minute by minute,  to the perfection which should always be our chief human objective and unceasing  mission.

 Research, improved procedures, improved outcomes, the gift of health, even the  gift of life itself.

 I am about to undergo a medical procedure called colonoscopy. It is the  third time in the last 13 years that my colon has been scrutinized, first by  sigmoidoscopy, which is a partial procedure done while the patient is fully  conscious, thereby able to see the entire matter first hand; twice by a complete  colonoscopy, ten years ago for the first; the second taking place at 7 a.m. tomorrow, just 24 hours from now.

 I am therefore at work preparing for this procedure, each aspect the result  of teams of physicians and medical researchers who have, bit by bit, improved  what is done and the medical skills and tools necessary to achieve the desired  result: quality and longevity of the most important thing we each have -- life itself.

 Since this life is so important, the very basis for our existence on Earth, we must  encourage, exhort, sustain and venerate those who advance it, in both length and  utility, and we must oppose, adamantly, vigorously, energetically, unfailingly, anyone  in any situation who does anything to diminish and destroy it. As the great humanitarian  Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965) said, "Ehrfurcht vor dem leben", ("Reverence for life")  must be at the heart of who we are and our every endeavor, particularly of the  researches we undertake.

 Homage to Madame Curie, (1867-1934), "haunted by dreams, invincibly eager".

 This poetic description of Marie Skodowska-Curie comes from the 1943 MGM film  starring Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon (as her husband Pierre), a film whose  world-famous subjects ensured world-wide interest and acclaim. Consider the  date of the film. Madame Curie's native country, the homeland she loved with all  the high ardor and profound devotion found in every Pole, was seething under  Hitler's savage rule, his intent nothing less than erasing her land and every person  therein.

 Her adopted nation, la belle France, writhed under the Nazis, too; abashed, humiliated,  mortified by events, mortified more by the collaborators who stained the glory of France  with treachery and abiding ignominy.

 In such a situation, the powers at MGM, many themselves emigrants from Europe,  lucky to be alive, decided to throw down the gauntlet, to tell a tale that would rekindle  hope, pride, and purpose in those dark days when the future was anything but halcyon  and joyful.

 And so Greer Garson, who had transfixed the world with her characterization of  Mrs. Miniver (1942), a lady whose innate decency, courage, and grace reminded  us what we could do, might have to do in this world at war to inch towards victory  and humanity, was tapped to bring Marie Curie, titanic, brilliant, heroic, enduring,  tenacious to life. The Nazis had nothing like this, either in film, or more importantly  in fact.

 The film, of course, awards galore, did what it was supposed to do, not least  enthusing multitudes of young people, including a record number of young women,  to enter the hard sciences of  chemistry, physics, mathematics and all the others  once reckoned the sole prerogative of men. Indeed, it is not too much to say that  Marie Curie was the godmother of generations of women scientists who thrilled to  her message, her serious intent, and the good work she did, the discoveries she  made, the lives she changed for the better, without giving up her femininity, spouse,  or family. It was an electrifying message for millions. It remains supremely relevant  today and is still by no means universally accepted.

 The music.

 It is now time to introduce you to the music for this article, the most apt sound  imaginable: the score to "Madame Currie". Composed by master Herbert Stothart,  probably best known for writing "The Wizard of Oz" in 1939, the music that edged  out "Tara's Theme" in "Gone with the Wind", arguably the best known movie theme  ever written, for the Oscar. He had his work cut out for him for he needed a sound  that was as beautiful as the science Madame Curie venerated and served, a pristine  acolyte at the forge of truth and knowledge. Go to any search engine now and  let the soaring sound by a composer of renown lift you... just as science and unending  research lift our species... if we will but let them. Sadly, alarmingly these are now  very much at risk. The little men and women of the Capitol are seeing to that,  to the general desuetude and disillusion.

 The fatal axe called "sequestration", the despair of scientists and researchers,  their important work for the Great Republic and every citizen at risk; the risk  that comes when the scientific progress we all have the right to expect is  curtailed by our own failure to act and so nurture and sustain it. 

 It is well known that the federal government needs $1 trillion in budget cuts. What  is far less well known is the devastation, the destruction, the ruination this will  cause the scientific and research communities. Listen then to Dr. Francis Collins,  director of the National Institutes of Health, who called 2013 the "darkest ever" year  for the agency, whose budget is at its lowest inflation-adjusted appropriations level  in more than a decade with all that means for scientists laid off, scientists (including  the vital supply of young researchers) not hired, bold projects unstarted, bold projects  left undone, the nation at terrible risk.

 Here are remarks by Steven Salzberg, the director of the Center for Computational  Biology at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, a well respected biomedical  researcher. "Less science is getting done," he said. "That means cures won't emerge.  Five years from now, when your aunt gets cancer and you can't do anything for her,  people won't stop and think, 'Jesus, if we only hadn't had the sequester!'" Does this  make any sense at all, or are we so far gone as a nation that we simply cannot be  bothered to save the science and research which have the potential to save us all?  Que sera sera, whatever will be, will be?

 Colyte, all through the night.

 While the politicians diddle, dawdle and duck the tough decisions, their irresolution,  cowardice and indecision thereby clouding our collective future, life goes on, not  perhaps as good as it could be, but definitely better than it will be, if the sciences and  their researchers are so dismissed, devalued, disdained. And so I follow the  procedural guidelines to the very letter, afraid that any departure will obscure the  result, perhaps resulting in the tragedy I most wish to avoid.

 The Day Of Your Test.

 4-6 hours before your arrival time.

 1) Drink one 8-ounce glass of Colyte every 10-15 minutes until the remaining half  of the Colyte is gone. You may have to get up in the night to take this dose.  You need  to do this for a good preparation.

 2) Immediately after drink 2 to 3 8 ounce glasses of Gatorade (preferred) or any  clear liquid.

 3) Continue to drink clear liquids until 3 hours before your scheduled arrive time.  Do not eat any solid food.

 4) Do not drink anything, including water, for 3 hours before your arrival time.

 And then it was time to leave, on a voyage discovering myself, hopeful but  understandably nervous notwithstanding. I must have looked pale and wan  for when I got out of the car, my driver Aime Joseph hugged me and said "Courage,  mon ami," something he had never done before.

 Then, promptly, efficiently, professionally my Endoscopy Center team went to  work. Receptionist Louise, perky and soothing at 6:30 a.m. Followed by Jack,  the first nurse, friendly, focused, a man of ease putting me at mine. Then nurses  Kathryn and Pat, smiling, reassuring, glad they said to have a patient as well  prepared as I was, thereby assuring my regard and gratitude; finally, Dr. Lopes,  brisk, amicable, explaining all as we went, master of his craft and of practiced  patient care; the physician who gave me the news, all good, no cancer, no growth,  no troubling polyps, good to go for another decade and a day. That's good for me,  of course, but with the sequester and further cuts, will you get care as good, thorough,  and prompt?  It matters.

 Colorectal cancer is the third most commonly diagnosed cancer in the world, but  it is more common in developed countries. It is estimated that worldwide in 2008,  1.23 million new cases were clinically diagnosed and that it killed at least 608,000  people. Do what's necessary to make sure you aren't one of them.

 Envoi.

 If you are a reader 50 and above, call your physician today and schedule your  colonoscopy and while you're at it, give this article to a friend. It's an act of love.


About the Author

 Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is the author of several books, ebooks and over one thousand on line articles. Republished with author's permission by Ruthsella Corasol http://WorkingAtHome101.com.


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