Life-saving tests

• By JOHN BOYD
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Mar 21, 2008 - Page: 1E - UPDATED: 03.21.08

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Clara Lawson was reluctant to talk about her colonoscopy even after it detected the cancerous growth that, unfound, would have cost the Denham Springs resident her life.

After detecting potentially life-threatening growths in two additional colonoscopies, Lawson is less sheepish to discuss the procedure that turns cheeks red and saves lives across the state.

“To know that the last two times I’ve had the test done they found a polyp that could have become cancerous — it’s just something you have to do,” said Lawson, 45, a health initiatives representative with the American Cancer Society’s Baton Rouge office.

A colonoscopy is an invasive, though relatively painless, procedure in which a small camera device is inserted into the colon to detect cancer-causing polyps on the colon wall.

If a polyp is detected before turning cancerous, it can be removed by the doctor immediately and no further treatment is needed.
Colonoscopies are recommended at three- to five-year intervals starting at age 50.

Dr. Jay Brooks, chief of hematology and oncology of Ochsner Health System of Baton Rouge, calls the colonoscopy 99 percent effective in diagnosing polyps.

The American Cancer Society predicts the screening could cause the kind of sharp decline in colorectal cancer deaths that the pap smear caused for cervical cancer.

But Louisianians just haven’t heard the call.

The state leads the nation in the rate of deaths from colorectal cancer and is tied for second in overall incidences.

“Probably the biggest reason is we don’t do a good enough job screening patients,” Brooks said.

Part of the reason is the squeamish-factor.

“The population hasn’t accepted the advice of physicians,” Brooks said, “nor have we urged our patients enough to get colon cancer screenings.”

Brooks and Lawson both say the worst part of the colonoscopy is not the procedure at all, but the colon-clearing liquid the patient has to drink the night before (It tends to tie one to a bathroom for the evening.).