That call we all dread

Today I was in line at CVS picking up my mom's medicine. The girl behind the window was in a bad mood and she couldn't find all of mom's medicine. About that time the phone rang. It was a number I didn't recognize. I normally don't answer the phone in that situation; however, I felt that I should.

The voice on the other line said, "Ms. Harkey" and I said, "Yes?" He said, "This is Dr. Smith, are you having a good day?" I said, "Yes, but I'm in line at CVS." He said, "I need to talk to you - can I hold or would you like me to call you back?" In the past he has always said, "Your pathology looks fine. I just wanted to let you know. Have a good day."

Now a little background. I'm a tumor registrar by trade. When a dermatologist calls and says he wants to talk to me and about a week ago he just scraped some of my skin away it makes my heart beat faster and my head start spinning.

He promised to call me back in about 10 minutes. He's a doctor and most doctors cannot tell time. So really in about 35 minutes he called back (I'm sure he was busy calling other patients). He told me that neither of the places he removed were malignant or cancer (whew!) but one of them was precancerous and he needed to reexcise it for margins. Now he didn't use that terminology but I knew what he meant. Okay, we got it early. That is a good thing.

What he didn't tell me that I know is that they are going to examine the heck out of the margins and make sure there is no change and that I should not miss my yearly examination anymore no matter how humiliated it makes me feel. So on October 1 I get to go see my rheumatologist about my Lupus at 8:45 and then I get to go see Dr. Smith to get a straight excision (I've never had any of them really get it that straight) with a few stitches. At least he let me wait until I get back from California. Oh, he did remind me to wear sunscreen on my trip (at least 50 SPF and don't forget the hat)!

So if you are late for your mammogram, pap smear, colonoscopy, skin screening, prostate exam or DRE I beseech you dear brother or sister to make an appointment tomorrow. Early is always better!