Colonoscopies worse than useless - no cancer death reduction, high risk of side effects

haidut

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Yet another medical procedure touted as one of the pillars in the long-lost "War on Cancer", has turned out to be a dud. I did a post on a study several years ago demonstrating that taking a daily aspirin likely outweighs the benefits of colonoscopies while also having a much more acceptable risk profile. However, at the time colonoscopies were too popular to attack directly, so the study did not dare conclude the obvious - i.e. take your daily aspirin and skip the GI doctor visit.

Aspirin Can Fully Replace Your Annual Colonoscopy

Hopefully, the study below will give most patients and doctors second thoughts, especially considering the known, frequent, and potentially lethal side effects of colonoscopies. On a similar note, another very large recent study found that colonoscopy's cousin - the endoscopy - was also worse than useless. Namely, no reductions in cancer deaths and a very high risk of (potentially lethal) side effects. Yet other studies have demonstrated similar lack of benefit for other, less invasive, cancer prevention methods such as PSA test for prostate cancer, fecal calprotectin for colon and liver cancer, antidiuretic hormone test for lung cancer, BRCA gene testing for breast cancer, etc. One by one, the "miracles" of modern medicine in regards to disease prevention turn out to be little more than expensive (and dangerous) frauds. I can't help but make the comparison between the failure of those highly touted medical interventions and another recent highly-touted, expensive and dangerous public health fiasco, which came damn near close in becoming mandatory too. Yes, I am referring to the masks, vaccines, and lockdowns imposed on us with the excuse of launching another war - on COVID-19. Now, if the level of "success" in those medical procedures above is a surrogate measure for the overall competence of our public health officials, it seems prudent to seriously question and/or oppose any future attempt at imposing any nation-wide health policies, unless very strong evidence backing them up is presented.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2208375
New study examines the effectiveness of colonoscopies | CNN

"...Colonoscopies are a dreaded rite of passage for many middle-age adults. The promise has been that if you endure the awkwardness and invasiveness of having a camera travel the length of your large intestine once every decade after age 45, you have the best chance of catching – and perhaps preventing – colorectal cancer. It’s the second most common cause of cancer death in the United States. Some 15 million colonoscopies are performed in the US each year. Now, a landmark study suggests the benefits of colonoscopies for cancer screening may be overestimated. The study marks the first time colonoscopies have been compared head-to-head to no cancer screening in a randomized trial. The study found only meager benefits for the group of people invited to get the procedure: an 18% lower risk of getting colorectal cancer, and no significant reduction in the risk of cancer death. It was published Sunday in The New England Journal of Medicine."
 
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tastyfood

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There aren't any side effects listed in the links you provided? Is the main risk perforation of the intestine from the procedure?
 

tastyfood

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This is the only thing listed in the sub-headline: Also, colonoscopies come with a risk of perforation of the intestine, bleeding or incontinence
 

tankasnowgod

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This is the only thing listed in the sub-headline: Also, colonoscopies come with a risk of perforation of the intestine, bleeding or incontinence
Um, isn't that enough? If you haven't seen it, here is one man's horror story, who goes by "Wolverine" after his intestine was "perforated." He does post some Medically Graphic pictures-

 

tastyfood

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Um, isn't that enough? If you haven't seen it, here is one man's horror story, who goes by "Wolverine" after his intestine was "perforated." He does post some Medically Graphic pictures-


Yes, it's grave enough. It went over my head that that's the main risk. I think with the title of the post I was looking to see other side effects listed. Thanks for the link.

I did 2 sessions of colon irrigations 8 years ago and I always wondered if they did any damage that I'm no aware of. The colon irrigation doesn't go as far as the colonoscopy of course, so I'm probably overthinking it.
 

tankasnowgod

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"...Colonoscopies are a dreaded rite of passage for many middle-age adults. The promise has been that if you endure the awkwardness and invasiveness of having a camera travel the length of your large intestine once every decade after age 45, you have the best chance of catching – and perhaps preventing – colorectal cancer.

Another thing that I read somewhere, I think on that "Roar of Wolverine" blog I posted above, is that there is no possible way to sterilize that camera. The only proper way to do it would be to boil it in water, or heat it at a temperature higher than the electronics can stand.

So, unless they have gone to one time disposable cameras, or you are the first one that it is used on, well, you might also be signing up for an uncontrolled fecal transplant..... or several of them, all at once.
 

Giraffe

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There aren't any side effects listed in the links you provided? Is the main risk perforation of the intestine from the procedure?

Check this review:

 

Normal Human

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Already in Europe colon cancer screening revolves mostly around a fecal occult blood stool test (non-invasive, simple stool test) every 2 years unless the person is considered "high-risk" due to strong family hx of colon cancer. Already this is known to be no "less-effective" than full colonoscopy. Originally, I had thought this similarity in "effectiveness" was due to the veracity of the fecal occult blood stool test; now I guess we know it was just because the supposed "benefits" of colonoscopy for cancer screening were largely illusory in the first place.
 

Dave Clark

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Yeah, they scarred my Mom's colon doing a colonoscopy. They said her colon may have been compromised when she gave birth years ago, but when doing the procedure, they kept on pushing to get the device through, until they had to abort the mission because they scarred her colon. So, her colon was in better shape going in, than coming out. She said, never again, to which I agreed. the lowest rates of colon cancer in the world are countries who consume the most turmeric/curcumin, of course they don't want you to know this and do anything preventative, lol.
 
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haidut

haidut

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Thread '"The Great Prostate Hoax: How Big Medicine Hijacked The PSA Test And Caused A Public Health Disaster' "The Great Prostate Hoax: How Big Medicine Hijacked The PSA Test And Caused A Public Health Disaster

Great, thanks. Didn't know there was even a book written about it. To make the fraud/incompetence even worse, not only is PSA not a good predictor of prostate cancer but its levels are driven mostly by estrogen, while DHT (the official villain in this disease) actually lowers PSA.
 

jmparret

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I read about the dangers of colonoscopies about a month after i got one, so never again. I also read some bad stuff about root canals and infections.
That is extremely dangerous and common. Just pull the tooth. I could not find the original story but here is a good one
I know this is changing the subject but it is another medical thing that should be avoided.
 

J.R.K

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Yet another medical procedure touted as one of the pillars in the long-lost "War on Cancer", has turned out to be a dud. I did a post on a study several years ago demonstrating that taking a daily aspirin likely outweighs the benefits of colonoscopies while also having a much more acceptable risk profile. However, at the time colonoscopies were too popular to attack directly, so the study did not dare conclude the obvious - i.e. take your daily aspirin and skip the GI doctor visit.

Aspirin Can Fully Replace Your Annual Colonoscopy

Hopefully, the study below will give most patients and doctors second thoughts, especially considering the known, frequent, and potentially lethal side effects of colonoscopies. On a similar note, another very large recent study found that colonoscopy's cousin - the endoscopy - was also worse than useless. Namely, no reductions in cancer deaths and a very high risk of (potentially lethal) side effects. Yet other studies have demonstrated similar lack of benefit for other, less invasive, cancer prevention methods such as PSA test for prostate cancer, fecal calprotectin for colon and liver cancer, antidiuretic hormone test for lung cancer, BRCA gene testing for breast cancer, etc. One by one, the "miracles" of modern medicine in regards to disease prevention turn out to be little more than expensive (and dangerous) frauds. I can't help but make the comparison between the failure of those highly touted medical interventions and another recent highly-touted, expensive and dangerous public health fiasco, which came damn near close in becoming mandatory too. Yes, I am referring to the masks, vaccines, and lockdowns imposed on us with the excuse of launching another war - on COVID-19. Now, if the level of "success" in those medical procedures above is a surrogate measure for the overall competence of our public health officials, it seems prudent to seriously question and/or oppose any future attempt at imposing any nation-wide health policies, unless very strong evidence backing them up is presented.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2208375
New study examines the effectiveness of colonoscopies | CNN

"...Colonoscopies are a dreaded rite of passage for many middle-age adults. The promise has been that if you endure the awkwardness and invasiveness of having a camera travel the length of your large intestine once every decade after age 45, you have the best chance of catching – and perhaps preventing – colorectal cancer. It’s the second most common cause of cancer death in the United States. Some 15 million colonoscopies are performed in the US each year. Now, a landmark study suggests the benefits of colonoscopies for cancer screening may be overestimated. The study marks the first time colonoscopies have been compared head-to-head to no cancer screening in a randomized trial. The study found only meager benefits for the group of people invited to get the procedure: an 18% lower risk of getting colorectal cancer, and no significant reduction in the risk of cancer death. It was published Sunday in The New England Journal of Medicine."
Thank you for posting this, it adds more evidence to the pile, that one of the best things to protect your health is to know the facts.
 

Lilac

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A friend just ended up in the hospital because taking the prep liquid went awry. I'm not sure if the instructions were written wrongly or badly or if he didn't follow them correctly--or if he just had a bad reaction. He lost a mass of electrolytes and spent a night in the hospital, thinking this was it at some point.

And of course he is rescheduling the colonoscopy.
 

Don

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Um, isn't that enough? If you haven't seen it, here is one man's horror story, who goes by "Wolverine" after his intestine was "perforated." He does post some Medically Graphic pictures-

HOLY SH!T thats scary.
 

tankasnowgod

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Great, thanks. Didn't know there was even a book written about it. To make the fraud/incompetence even worse, not only is PSA not a good predictor of prostate cancer but its levels are driven mostly by estrogen, while DHT (the official villain in this disease) actually lowers PSA.
The author of that book is Richard J. Albin, the man who discovered PSA in the first place. As such, they probably have to ignore and bury his work as much as possible. It's always a tough sell to claim that the person who first discovered something and then helped to invent a test to detect it really doesn't have any idea what he's talking about in regards to that subject.
 

Mito

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Thread '"The Great Prostate Hoax: How Big Medicine Hijacked The PSA Test And Caused A Public Health Disaster' "The Great Prostate Hoax: How Big Medicine Hijacked The PSA Test And Caused A Public Health Disaster

PSA is one of the tests that can be artificially elevated if supplementing biotin.
 

Sherbert

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Yet another medical procedure touted as one of the pillars in the long-lost "War on Cancer", has turned out to be a dud. I did a post on a study several years ago demonstrating that taking a daily aspirin likely outweighs the benefits of colonoscopies while also having a much more acceptable risk profile. However, at the time colonoscopies were too popular to attack directly, so the study did not dare conclude the obvious - i.e. take your daily aspirin and skip the GI doctor visit.

Aspirin Can Fully Replace Your Annual Colonoscopy

Hopefully, the study below will give most patients and doctors second thoughts, especially considering the known, frequent, and potentially lethal side effects of colonoscopies. On a similar note, another very large recent study found that colonoscopy's cousin - the endoscopy - was also worse than useless. Namely, no reductions in cancer deaths and a very high risk of (potentially lethal) side effects. Yet other studies have demonstrated similar lack of benefit for other, less invasive, cancer prevention methods such as PSA test for prostate cancer, fecal calprotectin for colon and liver cancer, antidiuretic hormone test for lung cancer, BRCA gene testing for breast cancer, etc. One by one, the "miracles" of modern medicine in regards to disease prevention turn out to be little more than expensive (and dangerous) frauds. I can't help but make the comparison between the failure of those highly touted medical interventions and another recent highly-touted, expensive and dangerous public health fiasco, which came damn near close in becoming mandatory too. Yes, I am referring to the masks, vaccines, and lockdowns imposed on us with the excuse of launching another war - on COVID-19. Now, if the level of "success" in those medical procedures above is a surrogate measure for the overall competence of our public health officials, it seems prudent to seriously question and/or oppose any future attempt at imposing any nation-wide health policies, unless very strong evidence backing them up is presented.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2208375
New study examines the effectiveness of colonoscopies | CNN

"...Colonoscopies are a dreaded rite of passage for many middle-age adults. The promise has been that if you endure the awkwardness and invasiveness of having a camera travel the length of your large intestine once every decade after age 45, you have the best chance of catching – and perhaps preventing – colorectal cancer. It’s the second most common cause of cancer death in the United States. Some 15 million colonoscopies are performed in the US each year. Now, a landmark study suggests the benefits of colonoscopies for cancer screening may be overestimated. The study marks the first time colonoscopies have been compared head-to-head to no cancer screening in a randomized trial. The study found only meager benefits for the group of people invited to get the procedure: an 18% lower risk of getting colorectal cancer, and no significant reduction in the risk of cancer death. It was published Sunday in The New England Journal of Medicine."
in the same vein, wondering how un/safe those those little camera capsules (they suggest we ingest) are
 

HLP

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Yet another medical procedure touted as one of the pillars in the long-lost "War on Cancer", has turned out to be a dud. I did a post on a study several years ago demonstrating that taking a daily aspirin likely outweighs the benefits of colonoscopies while also having a much more acceptable risk profile. However, at the time colonoscopies were too popular to attack directly, so the study did not dare conclude the obvious - i.e. take your daily aspirin and skip the GI doctor visit.

Aspirin Can Fully Replace Your Annual Colonoscopy

Hopefully, the study below will give most patients and doctors second thoughts, especially considering the known, frequent, and potentially lethal side effects of colonoscopies. On a similar note, another very large recent study found that colonoscopy's cousin - the endoscopy - was also worse than useless. Namely, no reductions in cancer deaths and a very high risk of (potentially lethal) side effects. Yet other studies have demonstrated similar lack of benefit for other, less invasive, cancer prevention methods such as PSA test for prostate cancer, fecal calprotectin for colon and liver cancer, antidiuretic hormone test for lung cancer, BRCA gene testing for breast cancer, etc. One by one, the "miracles" of modern medicine in regards to disease prevention turn out to be little more than expensive (and dangerous) frauds. I can't help but make the comparison between the failure of those highly touted medical interventions and another recent highly-touted, expensive and dangerous public health fiasco, which came damn near close in becoming mandatory too. Yes, I am referring to the masks, vaccines, and lockdowns imposed on us with the excuse of launching another war - on COVID-19. Now, if the level of "success" in those medical procedures above is a surrogate measure for the overall competence of our public health officials, it seems prudent to seriously question and/or oppose any future attempt at imposing any nation-wide health policies, unless very strong evidence backing them up is presented.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2208375
New study examines the effectiveness of colonoscopies | CNN

"...Colonoscopies are a dreaded rite of passage for many middle-age adults. The promise has been that if you endure the awkwardness and invasiveness of having a camera travel the length of your large intestine once every decade after age 45, you have the best chance of catching – and perhaps preventing – colorectal cancer. It’s the second most common cause of cancer death in the United States. Some 15 million colonoscopies are performed in the US each year. Now, a landmark study suggests the benefits of colonoscopies for cancer screening may be overestimated. The study marks the first time colonoscopies have been compared head-to-head to no cancer screening in a randomized trial. The study found only meager benefits for the group of people invited to get the procedure: an 18% lower risk of getting colorectal cancer, and no significant reduction in the risk of cancer death. It was published Sunday in The New England Journal of Medicine."
Thank you for all you do. Been following closely for many years. I'm helping a cancer patient who is so far gone they didn't offer chemo or radiation. Thankgoodness. He has put lived his expiry date by 6 months now. Low platelets discovered this week. I have your Cypro drops and wonder how he should use them. His TSH was .55 last month but will add thyroid anyway. Any other ideas. Progesterone for platelets? My grandson survived low platelets over 10 years ago with Ray and Kira's help.Thanks in advance!!!
 

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