Time for a blood test...

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

I decided I needed to ratchet things up just a notch or two so I’d know when I went to the doc’s office on Friday just how bad the foot still was. I was going in for a PSA (prostate specific antigen) test, a screening for the presence of prostate cancer, and thought I’d kill two birds with one stone. My brother Jeff is a poster child for PSA screening. He has been visiting his physician regularly for years and it was the resulting increase over his baseline numbers resulting from his screenings that detected his prostate cancer and led to early and effective treatment. Apparently, there is controversy over the use of PSA results in determining the presence of prostate cancer, the second leading cause of cancer in the US, but he was interviewed at the Cleveland Clinic and featured on ‘Live on Five’ recently, declaring that without the testing, he wouldn’t be here today. A simple blood test allows laboratory technicians to determine PSA levels. PSA is a protein that is normally secreted and disposed of by the prostate gland. High PSA levels (more than 4.0 ng/ml) may indicate the presence of prostate cancer cells or other non-cancerous prostate conditions. However, in approximately 10% of prostate cancer cases, there is no rise in PSA above this threshold level, which creates a diagnostic problem for this group of individuals. Apparently, Jeff’s were low, but were trending higher than his baseline and thus led to more aggressive methods to determine if he had prostate cancer. In other words, I needed to quit procrastinating and get mine checked.

I called Holly and asked her if she’d like to go for a hike when she got home. She agreed to it, but wouldn’t arrive for another 45 minutes, so I used that time to work the foot harder with some very necessary leaf raking. I figured I’d follow the yard work with an hour hike and then go for a jog tomorrow…all in an effort to bring on more pain…and then be able to show rather than tell the doc what the problem was. I thought it made sense.

We walked the bridle trails from the bottom of Wilson Mills to the parking lot at the top of the hill, but since it was getting dark, returned on the paved bike path/road for the return trip. It was then that I noticed an increase in pain in my foot and figured it had something to do with the hardness of the surface. Still, it was better than yesterday, which continued to encourage me. By the time we reached the car, I was convinced that jogging 10 minutes tomorrow would make sense and still be following doctor’s orders. I’ll know in 24 hours…

Hike duration: 60 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 70 bpm.
Calories burned during workout: 420.