State of the Prostate

Today I had scheduled a phone visit from Dr. Chowdhury, the oncologist to whom I was referred for prostate cancer after a routine prostate exam turned up a "nodule" with just a "little bit of cancer" in it. The phone visit was scheduled for 11 AM, but at 9:40 I received a call from his accounting office, telling me that something about my health insurance policy had changed, and I was no longer covered!

Apparently, in addition to who has my insurance (United Health Care) and who it's through (AARP), there is also a "network". Mine was Phoenix Direct Network when I first started with Choudhury; but for some reason unknown to me, it had since been changed to Banner Health Network. The lady on the phone urged me to call "the number on the back of" my insurance card, to get them to fix this.

Before my 11 AM phone appointment, at which the accounting lady blurted that "apparently he wants to talk to you about your radiation treatments". So I now knew what he intended to talk to me about.

I contacted the insurance company and spoke with a nice lady from Texas named Geraldine. She was able to switch networks back for me, and even wished me luck with the radiation treatments.

However, at 11 AM, I did not receive a call. When I still hadn't gotten a call by 11:20, I tried calling his office and was informed my appointment was actually at 11:30.

At 11:31, my phone rang, and it was him and with better news than I expected, as he did not want to start me on radition…yet.

"The spot of cancer is just at 10 millimeters. The guideline is to start radiation at 11 mm. You could start it now, but there's no real reason to. Also, we would be concerned should your PSA reach 7.5, but it's only at 5.6 as of your last test. Which was in…" He paused to look it up. "That was in last May, so you should get it checked again this month."

He also suggested I get another biopsy done next May. "I don't do them," he added. "I only deal with active treatment, so you'll be going back to your urologist, Dr. Volfson, for all that."

So, as he had suggested might be the case when I first saw him, we'll be operating on a wait-and-see basis for awhile at least.