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This couldn’t have had a good effect on people’s health — 39 Comments

1. Yep. my last PSA was 2 years ago. Just got one and guess what? It’s up. So now scheduled for a biopsy. Wonderful.

2. We’ve had the same thing happen with fairly routine notifications on periodic health checks. One of the problems – according to our doctor and nurse friends – is that health care facilities are chronically overworked these days, apparently a complication caused by both COVID redeployment as well as the increasing documentation burdens imposed by the Affordable Care act, which requires huge volumes of form-based input. You might have noticed this: Your physician asking questions while staring at his laptop. One of my friends, a Cardiologist, finds himself going to the hospital on Sunday nights to catch up in advance on the upcoming week. And we have had a few specialist appointments for routine annual checkups deferred as these physicians were being redeployed. In one case, the physician wasn’t going to be available and I met with a nurse-practitioner instead.

   But also I have noticed that generally speaking, there is a degradation of service quality across our society. Customer satisfaction seems to be something that businesses can increasingly take or leave. I think maybe this is a result of labor force reductions, either from rampant COVID subsidy checks or from the shifting post-Baby Boom demographic, I don’t know. It’s not a great development though, whatever the cause.

3. This kind of memory slippage happens to me all the time and I don’t think it has anything to do with covid. Maybe something to do with being retired from outside work though.

   Good luck with the PSA, physicsguy.

4. Aggie wrote, “But also I have noticed that generally speaking, there is a degradation of service quality across our society. Customer satisfaction seems to be something that businesses can increasingly take or leave.”

   I think that has been going on since before COVID, and accelerated with it. The bigger the company, the worse. And, sadly, doctors’ offices, too!

   physicsguy: Good luck!!!!

   By the way, I visited my dermatologist yesterday. He mentioned that 3/4 of his male friends in their 70s and 80s suffered from PC. YIKES!!!

   I mentioned to him that is office staff was excellent, and that since even before COVID they were head and shoulders above the staffs at other doctors’ offices. He beamed!

5. Yes, the COVID years just vanished in to the mist like they didn’t happen. At least for me.

6. Relief.

7. Yes, similar thing happened to me. Appointments and tests were delayed due to implementation of new pandemic protocols. Consequently, I was late finding out that I have a serious heart condition. Nothing that surgery or medication can correct, so I just have to live with it. Of course, since it’s medicine, the story gets a little more complicated, but not more interesting.

8. Good luck with the biopsy physicsguy. Please let us know how it goes.

9. Good news on the mammogram for Neo, and best wishes on the biopsy to physicsguy. Sometimes these number wobbles are merely wobbles. We can hope.

   I think a whole lot of medical offices have staffing problems, just like lots of other businesses.

10. Someone whose blog I read semi-regularly is, like me, a high risk for melanoma. She lives some place where either the bureaucrats or the health care workers decided that dermatology was not an “essential” function in a pandemic crisis. I, fortuitously, did not live in such a place. I went for my regular dermatology appointment. And had a biopsy. Melanoma in situ. I had it removed and the margins came back clean.

    I still keep thinking of that blogger. Or anyone else who lived in the same state they did. And thank God that I did not. Melanoma, if not caught early, has very poor prognosis. Whoever thought dermatology wasn’t an essential function was an idiot.

11. Best of luck to everyone currently facing possibly upsetting diagnoses. May everything turn out well.

12. As Instapundit says, “I’ve seen the lockdowns and the damage done.”

    Has there been any sort of accounting of the excess deaths from the collateral damage of the lockdowns – missed or delayed appointments, treatments, surgeries, etc?

13. Lately it seems that idiocy is a prime selection metric for bureaucracy. Malice and idiocy.

14. There has been a serous degradation of service in our society, I agree. It is symbolized by the response to “Thank you”, which is “No problem”, not “You are welcome”.

    The country is indeed plunging into the abyss, with incompetents and corrupts as our leaders. I doubt we will recover. Not with a zillion illegals sloshing around and rotten Democrats like Warren and Schumer everywhere.

    physicsguy: if biopsy is positive, be sure you understand the cure rate with radiation therapy is the same as with surgery. Our local urologists have abandoned prostatectomy, joined together, built a radiation center to which all their patients are sent. Side effects differ, but cure rate is the same!

15. Thanks for the support. PSA was 4.7 two years ago, but now at 4.3…weird,, but still above the 4.0 threshold. Rectal exam was negative. I’m sure part of the calculation is the lawyers hanging over the MDs to do the biopsy. My wife says if biopsy is negative then relief, if positive then get it treated. My BiL had his PSA go from 4 to 6 to 12. He had PC; a year later after prostatectomy and radiation doing fine. Playing golf etc and he’s 4 years younger than I am.

16. Your wife is exactly right physicsguy. If positive then just get it treated. My brother-in-law was diagnosed with PC a few years ago in his mid-sixties, followed by prostatectomy. Everything is fine now. Playing golf, sports with his grandkids, etc. We’ll be praying for you.

17. I kind of hate to be this personal, but, just to encourage you, physicsguy: I was in the same situation several years ago, discovered in annual checkup. Went to urologist, had biopsy, got the unwelcome news. But my urologist counsels that “watchful waiting” is a reasonable strategy until/unless PSA goes over 10. Treatments do have some downside. I opted for ww and get a test every six months. So far PSA has not gone over 7, and that was only once, 18 months ago. It was 6.something on both of the last two, and the most recent was actually lower. Apparently prostate cancer can be *really* slow growing. I’m 73 and doc says there’s a good chance something else will get me before p.c. does.

18. Mac:

    Good luck!

    Don’t you just love it when doctors say “don’t worry; something else will probably kill you first!” A lot of people I know have gotten that sort of suggestion.

19. The “degradation of service” is ironic given that every visit results in an email asking for a few minutes of my time to rate it all.

    I wish all good luck with their health. I myself am finally pulling the trigger and entered a program that will include a gastric sleeve operation.

20. Physicsguy, I was where you are a few years ago. Do the work and find the best option for yourself. There are surgical teams using the DaVinci machine (5-arm robotic) that are minimally invasive, and some of these teams have done thousands of operations – very very good track records, quick recovery. I’ve seen quite a few acquaintances regret the Wait & Watch. If you treat it early, there’s an excellent chance of getting rid of it completely. For a while, insurance companies were saying don’t even test, which was, I thought, cynically evil. It’s mostly a slow, old-man’s disease – something like 80% of men at 80, have it. But there are aggressive forms too, particularly for the African gene set. And since the prostate has a lot of blood flow, once it escapes the capsule it goes everywhere (bone and lungs are the most common spot) Best of luck.

21. Kate: “I think a whole lot of medical offices have staffing problems, just like lots of other businesses.”

    Certainly is true in my area. Some staff were fired for not getting the vaccine and a number quit because the stress was too much. The Covid fear level was cranked pretty high here in Puget Sound. My wife has to beg for her checkups. She should change doctors, but few are taking new patients.
    🙁

    I’m fortunate to have doctors who still seem to care about my health. I’ve had many routine checks, and various treatments since 2020. So, I don’t feel my health care has changed in spite of Covid.

    Physicsguy, I think Cicero’s advice is good. My friends who had prostatectomies had bad side effects. Those who chose targeted radiation therapy have had fewer side effects and the cure rate is the same. Be sure to explore all your options. Good luck.

22. DaveL 5:05pm said: Has there been any sort of accounting of the excess deaths from the collateral damage of the lockdowns – missed or delayed appointments, treatments, surgeries, etc?

    I suggest for an interesting counterpoint that you check out the work of the Ethical Skeptic, who has both a Twitter feed

    https://twitter.com/EthicalSkeptic

    and a blog

    https://theethicalskeptic.com/

23. Went to the dentist about 2 months ago.
    When asked when I was there last, I said about 2 years or so.

    According to their records, It was actually 4 years.
    I am sure it had nothing to do with covid.

    Oh well .

24. My wife and I used to go car camping every year at an awesome camp site on the south end of Big Sur. It became increasingly harder to get into. One year we realized it had been some years since we’d been there and decided to go again.

    My wife said, “Well, it’s been a couple years” and I said it had been at least 3, more like 4 years since we’d been there. She said, “There’s no way it could have been 4 years.” I pulled up the digital photos from our last visit and it had been 6 years prior.
    _____

    I agree with Dave L. Hopefully someone will take a serious look at excess deaths and tell us about, at some point.
    _____

    I’ve been on the phone to various bureaucracies a lot in 2022, and have noticed there is almost never a human available at the end of an automated system. The IRS isn’t even trying to put you into a queue. They just tell you it’s swamped at the end of navigating the numbers game and drop you.

25. Neo, thank you, and, actually, it does kind of please me to be told “something else will get you first.” It’s actually kind of comforting. Better the inevitable but yet unknown than something like “you’ve got a year.”

    Also, I’ve always taken the biblical three score and ten as somewhat of an expectation, and consider anything past that as gravy, or perhaps borrowed time. So, since I am in fact past that, I’m ok with whatever I get. On one side of my family I have people who lived into their 90s; on the other, I’ve already lived longer than any of them. So who knows what the genetic lottery (and modern medicine) will deal me?

26. Mac, a better way to think of a super-slow PC may be “Unless I live to something like 140, this is an irrelevant process in my body. A hundred other things are more important medically in the foreseeable future.” We’ll all be hoping it’s either nothing at all or an indolent process.

    If it turns out to be a real concern, I will just share my neighbor’s experience with the radiation treatment. They have learned to insert some kind of temporary injected foam thing that forms a protective barrier for the colon. I guess it dissolves or gets absorbed later. My neighbor sailed through with virtually no gut symptoms.

    I think with every passing year they get more clever with the radiation, beaming part-strength signals in from different directions so that the nearby tissue gets a mild dose while the cells of concern get a double or triple one at the point of intersection and reinforcement.

    Cornflour, best wishes about your heart as well.

27. Wendy, thanks, I think that’s pretty much what I was trying to say.

    From what my doc said, radiation is definitely the preferable option if or when it does need treatment.

    They get more clever in general. Constantly amazing really. It’s one of the things I remind myself of when I’m thinking about what a wretched time we live in. Thirty years ago I had surgery for a ruptured disk. It was a pretty big deal, with an incision of several inches. Now they do it with lasers and stuff and just a tiny incision, with much easier recovery.

28. OMG! YES! This has caused a lot of problems to be pushed further down the road and get worse or not get the proper treatment at all.

    To paraphrase Neo – this isn’t about me or my elderly relative – it is to illustrate a point. I have an elderly relative living with me now who needs home health care.

    I tried a couple of long term care facilities; but, those that were able/willing to take new patients were very short staffed. As an example, one day I visited to find out that the aid from the night before was left alone with TWO floors of patients to cover which was about 60 patients. I’m sure that violated some sort of legal code the facility was supposed to meet. Another day I went to visit and heard her yelling “help! someone come help me!” from down the hall. She was stuck in a wheelchair for hours and was getting saddle sore; but there were only two aids on the floor and both were busy helping other patients go to the bathroom. It just broke my heart to hear her call out like that! So, home she came.

    When trying to get a home health aid to come to my house I couldn’t get anyone unless I was willing to pay for a minimum of 40 hours a week. Too many health aid workers were pushed out due to covid or left because of covid. The staffing shortage was bad before – covid made it worse. When I finally did get someone, the calling the day before to cancel or, worse, the no-shows were so bad I had no other choice but to cancel their service. I mean, why bother having a contract if they aren’t going to come.

    Finally after about a year of this nonsense I think I have found people willing to come every day. I’m keeping my fingers crossed and hope it continues to work out with people showing up every day.

    None of this help with the well being of a frail (now bed-ridden) elderly person. The fear of not knowing what help we were going to get was maddening for me and her!

29. I just wanted to tell you that mammograms aren’t that great.

    I have MBC and the earliest signs of it were skin rash and other skin oddities in the upper torso, and occasional swollen lymph glands behind the ear and in the groin. No lumps.

    Worldwide and in the US, 1 out of 8 women develop breast cancer. In my experience skin changes were the earliest sign and I didn’t take them seriously. Examine the skin for odd qualities – streaks, warts, measly looking rash.

    I was diagnosed in March 2020 just as the world locked down. Healthcare in the US since then has become an insane asylum.

    Take yer vitamin D.

30. Physicsguy,

    I agree with Aggie. I too had the dreaded elevated PSA but received wonderful care by a great urologist. Hopefully your biopsy will be negative, but if not, the medical world seems to have a great handle on treating the prostrate …

    I also had missed several PSA tests because of Covid …

31. Aggie wrote, “But also I have noticed that generally speaking, there is a degradation of service quality across our society. Customer satisfaction seems to be something that businesses can increasingly take or leave.”

    Except at Trump International hotel in Las Vegas. We are staying there in preparation for surgery this coming Thursday for my wife. The one place there where employment shut down service is that they have suspended their airport shuttle. But they still polish the brass in the elevator every couple hours, remove any trash in the halls within the hour, show up within 10 minutes if your door is propped open, and gave me the chicken free last night that I had thought I had ordered, but the bartender had thought that I had declined.

    We hadn’t been to the surgeon’s office in maybe 10 years, and it hadn’t changed much, except for the idiotic masking requirement. But that feels more like a government mandate, since he didn’t unmask when he was with her, and they are decently good friends.

    But we are in Las Vegas because the referral we got in PHX from her doctor there had spent his 15 minutes with her facing away from her, and typing on his keyboard, not even touching her, or running any X Rays. He charged $300, above and beyond what her BC/BS Gold plan payed. He was listed as a department head at the neighborhood Mayo Clinic, which was disappointing. Their ER department was disappointing for her too.

    But I had the opposite experience there at our neighborhood (PHX) Mayo Clinic. Came in through the ER, and the hand surgeon on call that night was head of his dept. He has been spectacular. Not only extremely skilled, but keeps us both in the loop, explains everything to us (as well as his resident, PA, etc), pops by whenever I have had follow ups with his PA, and never types on a keyboard when dealing with me as a patient. Always stays engaged with me, the patient. The whole hospital runs like a well oiled machine. We jokingly call it the Four Seasons Mayo Clinic, for the room service available for in patients. They give you an extensive menu that you order from, over the phone, and your meal shows up a bit later in your room. They were also running 2 patients per RN on the floor, instead of the usual 6-8 per RN, with LPNs and CNAs picking up the bulk of the work.

32. My best friend from high school died in 2021. She had diabetes which was poorly controlled. She had neuropathy from the diabetes and it was beginning to affect her eyes. She was absolutely terrified of getting covid and I know she died because she was too afraid to see her doctor.
    My own doctor is good and I like him but he does do the typing thing but he stops when I ask a question.

33. The phenomenon Neo describes is very real. A sister, brother-in-law, and 2 close friends of mine were diagnosed with advanced stage cancer last year after having delayed their routine medical visits during the covid “scare”. Two of them have now died, both well before their time.

    IMHO, the pandemic response imposed on us by our medical-political-corporate leaders was worse than the disease. They should hang their heads in shame (though I know they won’t).

34. Lee also:

    “Whoever thought dermatology wasn’t an essential function was an idiot.”

    That would have been a government bureaucrat. CMS had this all teed up, ready to roll out.
    Even had the specific surgeries that could and could not be booked named.
    (There you go, conspiracy theorists.)
    Either a government employed physician or an attorney, most likely. Or a public health school grad.
    OKd by some politician–not known for their medical expertise.

    They are the ones who decided the guidelines from the FDA and CDC–for the first time in history–should determine how patients are cared for, thus being responsible for the virtual PROHIBITION of effective, early treatment.
    And the resulting –oh, let’s just say 500,000–deaths in this country. (Studies from around the world show a 40-70% reduction in hospitalization. Oh, to have lived in the third world country these past two years, where you could get HCQ or IVM for Covid!)

    The law school and public health school grads who populate CMS, the hospital systems’ executive levels, who wrote the (likely UNSOLICITED, I bet) letter from the Federation of State Boards of Medicine threatening to delicense physicians who gave early treatment–that is who committed these crimes against humanity, pretty much. Along with their government employed physician collaborators.

35. In a responsive democracy (aka rule by the mob) and not a democratic republic (rule by the law?) those “Leaders” might well be hanging for the deaths they facilitated (sounding like Geoffrey B?).

    But, hey, the Governors of NY, NJ, PA (?) essentially killed 10Ks in nursing home settings with their COVID response policies, so excess morbidity is consequence free.

36. Lee: I know exactly what you are talking about.

    I keep thanking my lucky stars I live in a state where dermatology wasn’t prorogated. And that I had a dermatologist who wasn’t a wimp. (Yea, I had to wear a mask there.)

37. Unlike most of my friends, I kept my doctor/dentist appointments through the pandemic, having suffered a stroke at the ripe old age of 42 due to fantastically high blood pressure and uncontrolled diabetes. I figured the danger from COVID was less than the danger posed by those two problems if I let them get out of hand and kept schlepping to the doctor’s office. Have to admit, it was kind of nice for about 18 months – no one in the waiting room, appointments were only like 15 minutes behind. Then last fall, people started going to the doctor again, and the place is a madhouse every time I go in.

    I suspect we’re just starting to see the damage caused by the last two years in healthcare and education…we don’t like the answers now, and we’ll like the answers we get in a year or two even less.

38. One benefit of the last two years — far more people are now aware that doctors, scientists and other “experts” are often incompetent, just as often corrupt, routinely dishonest and nearly universally cowards. This is a very, very good development.

    Hopefully it will help stop our fetish for experts and start the process of skepticism by the general public. Even better would be for the expert class to finally admit their complete absence of quality control processes and begin some serious mea culpas and self-examination.

    My doctor and I were talking about how his medical group routinely passes along CDC recommendations. I mentioned that the CDC had been exposed as consistently wrong, generally dishonest, and often corrupt. At what point do doctors have an obligation to be on notice of that record? At what point is it no longer a viable excuse to give harmful advice to patients and hide behind reliance on the CDC? He just shrugged and said something about avoiding getting in trouble with the certification boards or losing hospital privileges for spreading disinformation.

39. Just linked by Instapundit

    https://medicalxpress.com/news/2022-06-pandemic-social-distancing-perception.html

    “The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way people perceive the passage of time, according to an article published in the journal Science Advances.”

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