I haven’t talked
about STAR TREK yet, which isn’t like me at all!
ST was my
favorite TV show growing up, as an adult and now as an “old guy”. During the
opening week of the STAR TREK 2009 reboot, my dad (who introduced me to STAR
TREK), me (a total ST fan) and my son (who grew up with ST and at whom the new
movie was targeted) – went to see it. None of the wonder was gone and I love
the NEW as much as all of the old.
At any rate, it
got me to thinking about a scene from STAR TREK IV: The Voyage Home in which an
elderly woman is laying on a hospital cot waiting to go in for dialysis:
McCoy: [McCoy,
masked and in surgical garb, passes an elderly woman groaning on a gurney in
the hallway] What's the matter with you?
Elderly patient: [weakly] Kidney [pause] dialysis.
McCoy:
[geniunely surprised] Dialysis?[musing to himself] What is this, the Dark Ages?
[He turns back to the patient and hands her a large white pill] Here, [pause]
you swallow that, and if you have any more problems, just call me! [He pats her
cheek and leaves]
…a few moments
later…
Elderly patient:
[the dialysis patient is being wheeled down the hall after being given the pill
by McCoy] [joyfully] The doctor gave me a pill, and I grew a new kidney!
It made me
wonder for two reasons. The first was that while today breast cancer survival
rates are as high as 98% (for early detection and treatment), at one time
tumors could only be detected when they could actually be felt – and then the
ONLY treatment was radical mastectomy which, in the late 19th
Century removed not only breast tissue but muscles and all lymph nodes as well.
If a woman survived that, she was profoundly weakened and handicapped for the
rest of her life.
The introduction
of modified mastectomies (1950s), mammogram advances (starting in 1967),
ultrasound (late 1970s), followed by MRIs, digital mammography, 3D mammography
and increasingly refined chemotherapy (introduced in the 1940s), radiation
(early 20th Century) and lumpectomies combined with radiation
therapy (1970s) and most recently, hormonal treatment and genetic testing
improved treatment – and subsequently survival rates.
I’m going to
delve into the history of breast cancer later, but for now, let me just say
that while it still terrifies me even now; I do have a daughter and hold VERY
high hopes that either her or her daughter will someday be able to pop a pill
and cry out, “The doctor gave me a pill and I’m cured of breast cancer!”
Image: http://content6.flixster.com/photo/11/05/69/11056948_gal.jpg
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