Good Medicine with Andy Kessler

Yesterday I underwent an exploration of my nether realms to make sure the docs got all the cancer that was growing in me last year. My doctor and I agreed that now would be a prudent time to follow up my radical prostatectomy with a little recreational photography session inside my bowels.

So I now have undergone the dreaded tailpipe inspection so many men and women my age have experienced. I felt like I needed a sticker to paste on my upper left forehead, signed by the DOT, and good for two years.

At least I know my catalytic converter is in good working order.

I probably should not even be alive today, if not for the advances in medical science. The most life-threatening diagnosis the docs have come up with me so far is acute sleep apnea, for which I nightly don a face mask that forces pressurized air into my nose and throat to keep my air passageways open, my breathing steady, and my heart rate level.

People have died from this one, and at a young age, too. That scared me worse than the cancer--at least it was operable. The apnea steals your breath when you least expect it.
Like the Grim Reaper with a vacuum.

Modern Medicine is helping us to all live longer. The actuarial tables are all out of whack because people who are now 65 will probably survive to 85. “Kids” in their 30’s now have every expectation of making it into their 90’s, if they don’t get hit by a drunk driver walking through the parking lot, or have their car boosted at gun point.

I’ve been reading a book by Andy Kessler called “The End of Medicine,” (Harper-Collins) about how the advances in medical research from Silicon Valley are literally rebooting the way things are done…to us and for us. Medicine is morphing from the art of chronic care to the early detection and cure of disease. My story in a nutshell (about the size of a walnut, to be exact.)

Andy’s on the show Tuesday morning at 7:20a CDT to discuss.
See you on the Radio.