Tag: cancer

Today, the patients and cases we saw were quite normal, but it was the conversations out of the exam rooms that made the day memorable. The nurses and doctors are all pretty close, and act very much like a family: bickering and teasing each other incessantly. There was often lots of free times between patients, but the nurses kept it very fun! They like to call their clinic “the fun one”. We discussed where we would move in the future, many arguing for Arizona or Florida, and we discussed Minnesota accents, which they claim that Dr. Eisenbeis has.

One patient that stood out was this woman with smoldering myeloma that is not treated because it is not malignant, but it is like a ticking time bomb and could go off at any time, with no trigger. She was very on edge and nervous at first, but once the doctor said she was still fine, she calmed down. She stated that it is quite difficult to forget about her disease, even though she’s had it for almost 10 years, because there’s always a cancer commercial or ad. She even said that only her immediate family knows, because she doesn’t ever want to talk to relatives or people about it at family gatherings. At first, I didn’t understand her anxiety, but afterwards, I realized just how scary it is to live every day not knowing when you could contract cancer. After hearing so much about cancer for the past week, it seems almost normal or not as severe to me, but it is still scary and y predictable. It just made me realize how strong and inspirational those patients are.

Fun Facts:

• According to nurse Melanie, you can have five wives in Utah and there are penguins in Alaska.
• A phlebotomy is a procedure that removes blood to treat high iron levels or blood counts.
• The UNC Rex Hemonc Clinic in Cary is the fun office
• For one patient, his wellbeing is gaged on how often and how well he plays golf.

Today, I was still at the UNC Hematology and Oncology Clinic, which they nickname Rex Hemonc for short. Today was pretty normal, nothing out of the ordinary, but I did see a woman with blood clots in her calf. Most other patients were just new hematology patients, or just follow ups before they went for their treatment.

One case that stood out was this man with cancer who didn’t speak any English. We had to get a Chinese interpreter on the phone to translate for us. I speak a little mandarin, but definitely not enough to help translate! It was pretty cool to see how the doctors are so willing and ready to help all their patients, no matter their language or age. They also don’t discriminate based on the patient’s ability to pay, and they even have programs that help patients cover treatment costs.

Other than that, most patients were just referrals from their primary doctors who had an abnormal blood count, and the doctors just wanted to rule out cancer as a suspect. I’ve realized how scary the word “cancer” is in society, and I am guilty of this as well, but with modern medicine and technology, I’ve realized throughout this week that cancer is not always very severe. Many cancers have upwards of 90% cure rates, which is pretty amazing considering how complicated and different each cancer case is.

 

Fun Facts:

• Women who take estrogen-containing birth control are 4 times more likely to get blood clots
• Pet scans use radioactive liquid to show where tumors may lie in the body.
• The kidney, brain, and bladder all light up a lot on pet scans.
• Alex Trebek is in remission from Stage IV pancreatic cancer (yay!)

Today, we returned back to the UNC Rex Hematology and Oncology Clinic. I actually got locked out of the office, because I took the back entrance, but thankfully, Clare, a nurse practitioner, helped let me in. Clare is Dr. Eisenbeis’s nurse practitioner and she just returned from her two days at the hospital working in the in-patient clinic. She told us a funny story about this one lady, who she was trying to prescribe medicine to, who was allergic to EVERY antibiotic medicine. No joke, when Clare pulled up this lady’s list of allergies, the screen was just a jumble of letters from the countless medicines that were listed. It was something else that’s for sure.

However, other than that story, the day was pretty normal. Nothing out of the ordinary and there were some times where Dr. Eisenbeis, Clare, and I were just sitting in the fishbowl waiting and talking. Those moments were honestly some of the best of the day. We talked about everything from college to the Appalachian machete killer to sports. We even talked about this 41-year-old nurse who ran a sub 2:30 marathon, fast enough to qualify for the US Olympic Trials. Crazy! Needless to say, I feel like I got a lot more comfortable with the doctors there and was still able to learn a lot. They were talking to me about how important iron is for one’s health and how hard it is to maintain normal iron levels. For example, iron deficiency is extremely common because our bodies cannot absorb iron very well, but we also saw some patients who had a genetic mutation that caused them to have too much iron levels because their body absorbs too much. I feel like, after today, I have a greater understanding and appreciation for hematology because I knew a good amount about oncology, but I never realized how much information you can retrieve from just a small sample of blood.

 

Fun Facts:

• Individuals of African American descent have lower white blood cell counts compared to other races.
• A unit of blood of a person with hemochromatosis (surplus iron) has the same amount of iron as someone with normal iron levels.
• Clare was a swimmer in high school who walked on to the University of Florida’s team.
• Iron deficiency causes high platelet levels, low RBC count, and small RBC size.
• Four new patients didn’t show up to their appointments today: Dr. Eisenbeis theorized that either they knew enough that they didn’t think the appointment was necessary, or they got scared because they saw the word “cancer” on the clinic’s name.
• Pro tip: don’t google your diseases; WebMD is basically Wikipedia. A headache does not mean you have a brain tumor.