In a comprehensive medical interview taken over the phone by a hospital employee, a few questions were asked that struck me as odd. (I'd already answered most/all these questions for both the surgeon and the oncologist's offices. Now the hospital itself wanted its own record. I guess all bases must be thoroughly covered 'just in case'!) The employee talked rapidly and wrote as fast as she could. One answer I gave caught her quite off-guard.
Question: Have you ever had a serious illness? (She rattled off several).
I said, "No. No. No. Yes, I had osteoporosis. But I don't have that now." You could hear how stunned she was as she involuntarily said, "How'd you get rid of it?" I told her about Reliv.
To my limited knowledge, these were odd questions:
Question: Have you recently lost a lot of weight?
Answer: No. I've lost some, but not a lot.
(Update: I asked the surgeon’s nurse, Evie, why this question was asked. Was it solely because when a person finds out they've been diagnosed with cancer, they begin to worry and that the resulting weight loss is not good for their immune system / attitude? Or is there actually something to cancer that it causes you to lose a lot of weight?
Evie said, "A little of both. Losing a lot of weight without trying is one of the seven danger signs of cancer." I’ve since learned that doctors look for a rapid weight loss of 7 pounds or more, that is, if you haven’t been trying to lose weight.
Question: Have you had any x-rays taken in the last 6 months?
Answer: I had x-rays taken in January prior to having a tooth capped, a bone density test, x-rays after an accident, and a mammogram.
I asked why this question was asked. Her response was: "You are asked that just because we want to know if you've had any mammograms done at any other facility other than St. Alphonsus. If so, they might give us more or better information." I didn't point out to her that that wasn't exactly her question. “Have you had any x-rays taken? is different from “Have you had any mammograms taken recently?”)
Note:
”A summer 2000 study... looked at data collected over 40 years.. of women with scoliosis who received many diagnostic x-rays during childhood and adolescence. (They had a) 70% higher risk of breast cancer than women in the general population. The more x-rays a woman was exposed to, and the higher the dose of radiation, the greater her risk of breast cancer. Although the dose of radiation in a typical x-ray is now much lower than it was when these women were being x0-rayed, the point is still valid: Radiation is a potent risk factor for breast cancer; its effect is cumulative and mammography involves forcefully squashing the breast and then shooting radiation through it." Source: What Your Doctor May Not Tell You about Breast Cancer, by Dr. John R. Lee, M.D., p.11:
Question: At what age did you first start menstruating? When was your first child born? How many pregnancies?
Answer: 11. 19. 2.
Question: Are you allergic to plastic?
Answer: Not that I know of. Her question did call to mind the years I worked in a plastics factory when a teenager. Did this environment 'encourage' cancer?
Question: Have you ever suffered any physical abuse?
Answer: Yes, but that was over 30 years ago and not an issue with me anymore.
Her question raised a question in my mind: If conventional medicine doesn't believe that healing is could be a matter of 'mind over matter,' why do they ask such questions? Or, taking the opposite point of view: How could they believe on the one hand that it could possibly be and on the other, discount such a recovery course to a patient because it hasn't been 'scientifically proven'?
Question: Have you ever smoked? How long ago? For how long? How much a day?
Answer: Yes. I quit 33 years ago. I smoked previously to that for 7 years, a pack a day.
Do educators use this kind of information - that it can still effect your body long, long, long after you've quit! - when warning teens against smoking?
Question: What is the best way you learn? By sight or by hearing?
Answer: By sight.
At the end of the interview, she proceeded to give me a detailed description of how to get to the hospital building the morning of the 17th. I stopped her half-way and said, "Please tell my husband all this. Remember I learn best by sight, not by hearing?" She said, "Oh, yeah." Rex took the phone and understood all she described. Pretty funny!)
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