Fudging the Numbers for Calm Mongering

Leading causes of death have changed over the past four years. In the States, Covid slipped from 3rd to 10th place. Or did it? 

The numbers are from this study and discussed in this article.

Eric Topal looked more closely at the numbers. There were "still 50,000 [official] Covid deaths in 2023. Heart disease and stroke are not declining. Small reduction in cancer deaths."

Cancer and Lymphedema: Two Year Update

In the span of one year, from August 2016 to July 2017, I was told I had three tumours in my left breast which led to three surgeries, which provoked lymphedema, and my dad died, and both my adult kids moved back home in the winter, one at the end of a five-year relationship, the other because of a profound mental breakdown that kept him in his room for months afterwards, possibly exacerbated by a family trip I insisted he attend and will forever regret. Both of them were far too forlorn to be able to help with snow shovelling or kitty litter or dishes. They were there for comforting, not to comfort.

I soldiered on through it all, tending to the housework and taking minimal time off work. After the first surgery, I was berated by an administrator, in front of my class, for the inadequate midterm report comments left by the LTO who replaced me, so I was back in the classroom after two days following the next surgery. Getting told was just one too many things to tolerate on top of everything else. Being considered incompetent after leaving copious notes and coming back early felt like an undeserved cruelty I couldn't adequately handle at the time.

On Fostering Illusions and the Qualitative Leap

What do you do when well-meaning people dear to you advise you to ignore your doctors? (And what if the doctors are wrong?)

I generally rally against non-scientifically verifiable medical claims. I'm pretty open minded and willing to try anything, but I also scrutinize any available research before I write off some new thing as the next solution to everything, like coconut oil or vitamin D. A year ago I wrote about people trying to peddle naturopathic cures to me after I was first diagnosed, but more recently I've been challenged by some scientifically-minded friends and family over some of the changes I've actually adopted in my life after all that cancer stuff.

Prevention as an Ounce of Cure

Here's an update on what I've learned about lymphedema after an ALND. It's way less scary now that I know how to manage it, but it's still a drag. It takes about an hour away from me every day. I'm just in the earliest stages, and it possible to stay here forever, but not without a bit of effort - something breast cancer surgeons should make sure patients understand. It's all about retraining the lymph flow to take a different path through the body. Lymph nodes collect and clean out toxins (infection, etc.) from segments of the body. The body's divided into 'watersheds' which all get sucked to the closest lymph nodes, but, with some missing, some areas have to be redirected. Here's what's working for me right now, and what I wished I had known straight out of the hospital - just ten things!:

Lymphedema: A Research Study Overview

I'm cancer free, but very anxious about lymphedema. It's become a bit of an obsession, so, for anyone googling it, here are all the studies that I really should have researched before consenting to the Axilliary Lymph Node Dissection (ALND) surgery that half my doctors told me I didn't need, and the other half convinced me I should have had done months ago. In all that back-and-forth discussion, nobody gave me the harsh facts about lymphedema. They were all too focused on the cancer, so much so, that I really wasn't able to give informed consent based on their cheery consolations: "We don't see that so much; I wouldn't worry about it." The risk is small, but it's about as small as having cancer in my lymph nodes to begin with (somewhere between 15-30%). And the potential effect on my life is enormous. As far as I can tell, I basically agreed to risk being permanently disabled in order to have peace of mind that my cancer won't spread. Writing about it at least will briefly keep me from insanely measuring the circumference of my arms over and over.

My surgeon has taken a very Epicurean approach. He's quite convinced that there's no rhyme or reason as to why some people get it, so I should just live my life, without a compression garment, and not worry about it unless it becomes a problem. I asked about booking a kayaking trip eight-weeks post surgery, and he gave me his blessing. However, while it's true that there are risk factors beyond my control, there are also some things I can do to prevent this condition - things that patients should be told to do to decrease the risk. I believe he's negligent in not sharing the latest research. All of these doctors were. It shouldn't be up to patients to seek out studies to determine how to proceed. That's why they get the big bucks!!