5 ms·

45 years :( The article says illness, but which illness?

by cute_boi 2y ago

dezgeg 2y ago
According to his Mastodon, stage 4 colon cancer
- mmasu 2y ago
  do your colonoscopies early. It’s not a fun thing to do, but it can save your life
  - officeplant 2y ago
    It sucks that you have to basically choke the money out of insurance to get them done prior to age 45. I found polyps by paying thousands out of pocket when insurance told me 36 was too young and there wasn't enough blood in my stool. That's with a mother having them removed at 19, and older brother having them removed at 39.
    - bluGill 2y ago
      Given your family history they should have been done young. However they are not completely risk free and so for most of us the standard guideline of 50 is good enough. There are less invasive tests that can be done instead as well. They are not as likely to find cancer (which is why you should have done the more invasive colonoscopy), and if they do find anything you have to do a colonoscopy anyway, so for those with less family history who have unexplained bleeding while young they are a good option. Ask your doctor about the pros and cons of them if this comes up. (I suspect once you reach 50 a colonoscopy every 10 years is the right answer)
  - ANewFormation 2y ago
    The statistics on early detection are very different than most think. Colonoscopies were one of the only tests with a statistically significant positive outcome, but even that has been challenged recently by multiple studies. [1] I don't know the exact cause colonoscopies are not performing as thought, but for breast cancer it's quite interesting - basically treatment was improving at the exact same time early screening was being heavily promoted. And so years of survival continued to increase in a strongly proportional way to early screenings. Naturally people assumed the correlation was causal, but it turns out screening mammograms are only marginally effective and that women are significantly more likely to receive unnecessary treatment (treating small tumors that would not have developed into large malignant tumors) than to receive beneficial treatment. [2] If screening provides someone with piece of mind, then more power to them, but you're unlikely to meaningfully extend your life. [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03228-z https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03228-z [2] - https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1600249 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1600249
  - TacticalCoder 2y ago
    > do your colonoscopies early. It’s not a fun thing to do, but it can save your life It's actually not that bad. I did it six months ago (at 51 y/o, never having done any before that), after reading an identical comment on HN saying to just go and do it. I don't know about other countries but I could choose between no anesthesia at all, light one or full anesthesia. I went for the light one: you don't really fall asleep but you don't really remember either the silly things you say. After a few minutes (15 at most?) you're fully conscious again. Zero polyps to remove and all crystal clear, doctor told me to come back for a checkup in 5 or 6 years. So I confirm: just go and do it.
vanc_cefepime 2y ago
Could be anything, sadly. Tteck, from Proxmox helper scripts recently died as well but did inform the GitHub community it was appendiceal cancer. Sadly he went quite quick too. I had a medical colleague who unexpectedly died at 33 after Christmas. Life is short. Hug your loved ones and let them know you love them everyday.
- zblevins 2y ago
  Reading this while holding my new born and man does this hit you right in the gut.
  - giancarlostoro 2y ago
    As they get older it hits harder, just the thought of any harm.
    - zblevins 2y ago
      Yea, I find myself growing increasingly sensitive. I spent several years in Afghanistan and now the most mildest of violence even in media bothers me. I couldn’t imagine either of my sons having to go through that or anyone else’s children. Life is so incredibly precious and until proven otherwise rare.
  - IncreasePosts 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - zblevins 2y ago
      Sheesh man that’s pretty damn dark.
  - microtonal 2y ago
    Yeah. This really changed for me after getting a kid. The thought I hope to live long enough to see my kid do X crosses my mind on a regular basis. Makes you enjoy all of it much more, especially because a lot of things that I can see her do now, I wished to see ~10 years ago.
bragr 2y ago
Neither any of the articles I looked up nor his obituaries name the illness so I assume he wanted that kept private. Probably not how I'd handle it, but to each their own.
- bluGill 2y ago
  Depends. AIDS (this is treatable these days, but I'm using it as an example) would imply a history of something he would want to keep secret from his conservative church. Of course I have no idea what his religion is, nor what he died of. If it is cancer - while rare at his age it happens and isn't something I'd be embarrassed of but maybe he was. To some extent too, you don't get to chose this, those who write your obituary do. Perhaps his wife (I have no idea if he was marred) and him have a disagreement on what is embarrassing and so even though he would have shared this she wanted it secret.
  - fred_is_fred 2y ago
    This is some awful speculation. You speculate that he had AIDS and was embarrassed by his church or that his wife was embarrassed. You don't know if he was religious, you don't know if he was married, and you certainly don't know if he had AIDS. Why even comment?
    - bluGill 2y ago
      Speculation has a specific definition which does not apply (I checked several online dictionaries). I was offering examples of things, but not considering them and therefore was not speculating.

45 years :( The article says illness, but which illness?

dezgeg 2y ago

According to his Mastodon, stage 4 colon cancer

mmasu 2y ago
do your colonoscopies early. It’s not a fun thing to do, but it can save your life
- officeplant 2y ago
  It sucks that you have to basically choke the money out of insurance to get them done prior to age 45. I found polyps by paying thousands out of pocket when insurance told me 36 was too young and there wasn't enough blood in my stool. That's with a mother having them removed at 19, and older brother having them removed at 39.
  - bluGill 2y ago
    Given your family history they should have been done young. However they are not completely risk free and so for most of us the standard guideline of 50 is good enough. There are less invasive tests that can be done instead as well. They are not as likely to find cancer (which is why you should have done the more invasive colonoscopy), and if they do find anything you have to do a colonoscopy anyway, so for those with less family history who have unexplained bleeding while young they are a good option. Ask your doctor about the pros and cons of them if this comes up. (I suspect once you reach 50 a colonoscopy every 10 years is the right answer)
- ANewFormation 2y ago
  The statistics on early detection are very different than most think. Colonoscopies were one of the only tests with a statistically significant positive outcome, but even that has been challenged recently by multiple studies. [1] I don't know the exact cause colonoscopies are not performing as thought, but for breast cancer it's quite interesting - basically treatment was improving at the exact same time early screening was being heavily promoted. And so years of survival continued to increase in a strongly proportional way to early screenings. Naturally people assumed the correlation was causal, but it turns out screening mammograms are only marginally effective and that women are significantly more likely to receive unnecessary treatment (treating small tumors that would not have developed into large malignant tumors) than to receive beneficial treatment. [2] If screening provides someone with piece of mind, then more power to them, but you're unlikely to meaningfully extend your life. [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03228-z https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03228-z [2] - https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1600249 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1600249
- TacticalCoder 2y ago
  > do your colonoscopies early. It’s not a fun thing to do, but it can save your life It's actually not that bad. I did it six months ago (at 51 y/o, never having done any before that), after reading an identical comment on HN saying to just go and do it. I don't know about other countries but I could choose between no anesthesia at all, light one or full anesthesia. I went for the light one: you don't really fall asleep but you don't really remember either the silly things you say. After a few minutes (15 at most?) you're fully conscious again. Zero polyps to remove and all crystal clear, doctor told me to come back for a checkup in 5 or 6 years. So I confirm: just go and do it.

vanc_cefepime 2y ago

Could be anything, sadly. Tteck, from Proxmox helper scripts recently died as well but did inform the GitHub community it was appendiceal cancer. Sadly he went quite quick too. I had a medical colleague who unexpectedly died at 33 after Christmas. Life is short. Hug your loved ones and let them know you love them everyday.

zblevins 2y ago
Reading this while holding my new born and man does this hit you right in the gut.
- giancarlostoro 2y ago
  As they get older it hits harder, just the thought of any harm.
  - zblevins 2y ago
    Yea, I find myself growing increasingly sensitive. I spent several years in Afghanistan and now the most mildest of violence even in media bothers me. I couldn’t imagine either of my sons having to go through that or anyone else’s children. Life is so incredibly precious and until proven otherwise rare.
- IncreasePosts 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - zblevins 2y ago
    Sheesh man that’s pretty damn dark.
- microtonal 2y ago
  Yeah. This really changed for me after getting a kid. The thought I hope to live long enough to see my kid do X crosses my mind on a regular basis. Makes you enjoy all of it much more, especially because a lot of things that I can see her do now, I wished to see ~10 years ago.

bragr 2y ago

Neither any of the articles I looked up nor his obituaries name the illness so I assume he wanted that kept private. Probably not how I'd handle it, but to each their own.

bluGill 2y ago
Depends. AIDS (this is treatable these days, but I'm using it as an example) would imply a history of something he would want to keep secret from his conservative church. Of course I have no idea what his religion is, nor what he died of. If it is cancer - while rare at his age it happens and isn't something I'd be embarrassed of but maybe he was. To some extent too, you don't get to chose this, those who write your obituary do. Perhaps his wife (I have no idea if he was marred) and him have a disagreement on what is embarrassing and so even though he would have shared this she wanted it secret.
- fred_is_fred 2y ago
  This is some awful speculation. You speculate that he had AIDS and was embarrassed by his church or that his wife was embarrassed. You don't know if he was religious, you don't know if he was married, and you certainly don't know if he had AIDS. Why even comment?
  - bluGill 2y ago
    Speculation has a specific definition which does not apply (I checked several online dictionaries). I was offering examples of things, but not considering them and therefore was not speculating.