Don't Forgo That Routine Appointment
- As 2021 comes to a close this week, routine visits to the doctor are looming in the new year. We are here to remind you to not skip them!
- One story stands out among the rest: a 23-year-old woman who visited her doctor seven times during the pandemic before she was ultimately diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma.
- Her story serves as a cautionary tale to not only visit your doctor regularly, but how important it is to advocate for yourself.
With Covid-19 and the new Omicron variant still a persistent threat, it is more important than ever to visit your doctor because sometimes, they might catch something, like an early cancer. And catching that cancer early could be the key to beating it.
Read MoreChloe's Story
When Chloe Girardier, 23, contacted her doctor to report a five-month-long cough, she received scary news: she likely had Covid-19. The truth, though, was even more troubling.
Girardier is a home health care worker, but even as an essential worker, she was initially denied an in-person doctor's visit. She was repeatedly told that with no other symptoms besides a cough, she was not eligible for an urgent appointment.
"There were multiple times people asked if I had tested for Covid, and it was frustrating because other illnesses still exist and a cough isn't just a sign of Covid," Girardier tells The Sun. "I felt people would stare at me when I coughed, and people instantly assumed I must have Covid."
When Girardier initially came down with a cough over the summer, she assumed it was just a cold. She struggled to get a doctor's appointment, but finally was prescribed antibiotics, inhalers and acid reflux medication. Nothing helped.
After first being denied an in-person visit, Girardier visited the doctor seven times before realizing that she was losing weight, prompting her to insist on being given a chest X-ray. The X-ray revealed a 4-inch-wide mass on her chest, and she was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma.
Some of the symptoms of this rare lymphatic system cancer include an unrelenting cough, itchy skin, night sweats, fevers and unanticipated weight loss. Girardier was scheduled to begin intensive chemotherapy just days before Christmas.
Advocating for Yourself While Navigating the Medical World
But she's not done advocating for herself.
"I'm putting a complaint in to my doctors because I think I've been fobbed off for a long time due to my age," Girardier says. "I can't believe it wasn't looked into further and if I hadn't pushed for the chest X-ray, I may still not have a diagnosis."
Don't Forgo That Routine Appointment
Girardier's story serves as a cautionary tale to not only visit your doctor regularly, but also how important it is to advocate for yourself. If Girardier had listened to her doctor's dismissive take on her health, her situation could have been worse.
Instead, she chose to listen to her body, because no one knows your body better than you.
"This cancer could've been caught three months earlier and I'm just lucky it's this type of cancer and not one that progresses really quickly," she says.
Decline in Cancer Screenings Due to Covid
While her story is a hard one to read, it is hard to blame medical professionals as hospitals and clinics became easily overwhelmed with Covid patients.
Covid wreaked havoc on literally everything, including doctor visits. While some people, like Girardier, attempted to visit their doctor but were turned away, others were scared of catching the virus, especially at the height of the pandemic. This fear caused people to cancel or postpone their routine doctor visits and check-ups.
In fact, during an event that The Washington Post hosted in June, Dr. Norman "Ned" Sharpless, director of the National Cancer Institute, said there was a 95% decline in various kinds of cancer screenings, including mammography, Pap smears, as well as screenings for lung and colon cancer. Dr. Sharpless compared that to his initial "worst case assumptions," such as a 75% decrease in mammograms.
In addition, NCI predicts that over the course of the next decade, about 10,000 excess deaths will occur from breast and colon cancer in the United States alone as a result of pandemic-related delays in screening and treatment.
Those numbers are back on the rise as the world has adjusted to living with Covid-19, but if you take one thing from this article, let it be to visit your doctor in the new year. It could save your life.
Contributing: Joe Kerwin
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