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I?m asking gun & gunlaw experts for medical advice
JamesRK
Member Posts: 25,670 ✭✭✭
You'd think I would know better. [:D]
I went in for my quarterly doctor visit this afternoon. Since I was already there I asked him to look at the little red spot on the side of my head.
He looked at it and said "Oh, that's just a little (insert 50? doctor word). I can give you some salve for that."
I told him since it wasn't a big deal like a pre-cancer or something, I didn't think I would mess with it. He said "That's what it is, a pre-cancer."
He explained that it's no big deal, but I need to get rid of it. He gave me a prescription for the salve and told me I have three options. I can use the salve twice a day for a month and rot it off or I can go to a dermatologist and let him freeze it off, or I can go to a surgeon and let him cut it out.
He wants me to come back in six or eight weeks and show him what I did.
I'm kind of leaning toward going to a surgeon, but I can't make up my mind. The surgeon who cut that thing out of my wife's ear seems to do good work.
What would you do?
I went in for my quarterly doctor visit this afternoon. Since I was already there I asked him to look at the little red spot on the side of my head.
He looked at it and said "Oh, that's just a little (insert 50? doctor word). I can give you some salve for that."
I told him since it wasn't a big deal like a pre-cancer or something, I didn't think I would mess with it. He said "That's what it is, a pre-cancer."
He explained that it's no big deal, but I need to get rid of it. He gave me a prescription for the salve and told me I have three options. I can use the salve twice a day for a month and rot it off or I can go to a dermatologist and let him freeze it off, or I can go to a surgeon and let him cut it out.
He wants me to come back in six or eight weeks and show him what I did.
I'm kind of leaning toward going to a surgeon, but I can't make up my mind. The surgeon who cut that thing out of my wife's ear seems to do good work.
What would you do?
The road to hell is paved with COMPROMISE.
Comments
Surgeon needs to make boat payments!
[:0]
I assume an actinic keratosis.
CP
if it was cancer, they would cut it out with wide margins- the best way to treat early stages of cancer and hope it hasn't metastasized anywhere else also. but it isn't cancer, so do you still need to be that cautious?
if not, then any of those 3 methods should be good enough. whatever would be more comfortable and cost effective for you. I'd go with the freezing, get it over with in 1 day and probably a little cheaper than cutting it out.
but if so, obviously have it cut out and ask him why he didn't clarify that in the first place.
You'll be saving gas money to the doctor's office, you can keep the cash you're gonna spend on the visit and surgery and ...
save money on those followup visits. [:D]
Plus ... you can make it a little bit harder for him to make that boat payment[;)]!
As a teaching MD, I vote for freezing but cutting them off is OK.
I assume an actinic keratosis.
CP
Do you give GB members a discount?
The sun is a killer...I've spent 47 years, mostly outdoors, in the Sunshine State.
Shoot it off.
I could freeze them again, wait until they turn to cancer and have them surgically removed, or use the salve.
I opted to use the medication. It can be several hundred $, but with my insurance I don't think so. As he explained it, it is like a bad sunburn for about six weeks. The medication kills the pre-cancerous cells while allowing the normal ones to live.
He suggested I wait until after the summer is over. I wear a CPAP mask every night, so I don't know how that will work, but I plan on doing this in October.
Freeze's come back.
The "salve" is a joke.
You will look like a third place winner in a hachet
fight..but it will be done.
It's headed that direction anyway.
PS surgical removal may be best, because they can then take the specimen to the lab for definitive analysis. Best, Joe
Thanks,
OleDuk[:)][:)]
This is what it looks like. This is the best look I've had too. It's hard to get a good look in the mirror.
I think if I don't change my mind between now and Monday I'll make an appointment with the surgeon. I'm not worried about what it will look like. I got over being young and pretty years ago.
Thanks again.
I have had many skin cancers removed over the years (fair skin). The only one I was NOT concerned about turned out to be cancerous(tested at the nagging of my wife). Go to a good dermatologist and get a second opinion. If he has concerns, he will biopsy the spot, which is the ONLY way to know for sure if it is cancer or not. Better to be safe than sorry.
If you can't feel the music; it's only pink noise!
I developed a funny-looking mole & the doc froze it off.
My eagle no longer has a head.
[:(]barto[:(]
I have an eagle tattoo on my forearm.
I developed a funny-looking mole & the doc froze it off.
My eagle no longer has a head.
[:(]barto[:(]
i have a memorial cross tattoo i designed on my right arm and when i went in and got my smallpox vaccination for the deployment they wanted to stick the needle in the tattoo i was like no please do it someplace else. They kept saying it wouldnt scar up or anything. Finally they gave it to me outside the tattoo, needless to say i got a penny size scar near the tattoo now from the vaccine. Im just glad it wasnt in the tattoo cause it would have ruined it.