December 24th, 2008
You want to talk about colonoscopies?
Over this decade the colonoscopy has become a sort of right-of-passage for those of us in middle age.
Why? Blame Katie Couric.
She lost her husband to colon cancer, an especially nasty, aggressive cancer that can be, as they say, nipped in the bud through a routine procedure, of which she has since become a leading advocate.
I’ve had one. It’s not bad, if they knock you out for it. Getting ready for it is a pain, literally, but not a terrible one.
After age 50 you need one every five years. I’m counting the months.
Yet we all want to avoid it. Maybe we associate it with the jokes about aliens and their anal probes.
In any case, my September piece on virtual colonoscopies was the 7th most popular post at this blog for 2008. A study showed they can be as good as the real thing.
As I noted, the virtual procedure gets rid of the probe going up your butt, but you still have the same preparation, which is where the pain is, so what’s the advantage?
It’s that more people have them, and more lives are saved.
Won’t do it for me?
Do it for Katie.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist since 1978, and has covered technology since 1982. He launched the Interactive Age Daily, the first daily coverage of the Internet to launch with a magazine, in September 1994. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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