Craig, a retired internist, was 78 years old when his prostate cancer was diagnosed. He had recentiy undergone a TUR procedure to alleviate symptoms of BPH; no cancer was found at that time, when a pathologist examined the chips of tissue taken from his prostate. But within a year, Craig’s urologist found a nodule during a routine digital rectal exam, which turned out to be cancer localized to the prostate, with a Gleason score of 6.
Because of his age, Craig agreed with his doctors that external-beam radiation therapy was his best option. (Also, because of his age, he received treatment only in the prostate and seminal vesicles.) Craig began receiving doses of radiation every day. After a few days of treatment he began experiencing severe bowel problems, including debilitating diarrhea. These symptoms got better after Craig’s radiation oncologist changed his treatments to four times a week, which gave his lower gastrointestinal tract a chance to recover. The new treatment schedule helped considerably, he recalls, and “things subsided fairly well.”
That was twelve years ago. The radiation treatment worked, and he has been cancer-free ever since. “I went to see my urologist last year, and he joked with me, ‘I don’t know why you’re coming back, because your ten-year warranty is up!’” Since his treatment, Craig has traveled extensively with his family.
They’ve been, among other places, to London, Copenhagen, Prague, and Vienna; they’ve taken ocean cruises and flown to South America.
This is particularly remarkable because a few years after his treatment Craig began to be plagued with episodes of severe diarrhea, infection, and bowel problems that his doctors have been largely at a loss to explain. “I’ve had cultures, searches for parasites, everything you can think of, and they can’t find any explanation.” (One set of problems, including blood in his bowel movements, was attributed to some large polyps in his intestinal tract; these were removed several years ago, however, and the episodes of diarrhea have continued.)
The conclusion reached by a number of doctors, including a urologist, a radiation oncologist, an internist, and a gastroenterologist, is that Craig has what’s called an “irritable bowel” (a spastic, overly reactive colon prone to diarrhea) and that it is “secondary to”—a delayed effect of—his radiation treatment.
This is not uncommon; many men have delayed effects of radiation treatment, but these usually begin within a few months of treatment. In Craig’s case, his bowel problems may have been made worse by some of the antibiotics he’s been given over the years to combat infection. Craig’s self-diagnosis? “I think very probably the radiation made the colon irritable, and then the prolonged treatment with the mycins (antibiotics) might have been a contributing factor.” ”
Despite the episodes of bowel problems over the years, Craig does not seem to have slowed down too much over the last decade. In between their globetrotting expeditions, he and his wife are restoring an old family home on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. For Craig, radiation treatments have meant a gift of time and—bowel problems aside—good health. He has made the most of both.
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