Colonoscopy

Written By:  Andrew Eide

The medical community has a standard recommendation that once you are over a certain age, usually 50 years, they want you to have a Colonoscopy done every year. This, they claim, is a preventive measure that could help you detect polyps or colon cancer early enough to treat it before it becomes a major problem. Even with this recommendation from the medical community I refuse to get a Colonoscopy and I will give my reasons below.

(1) I’ve read enough articles to know that you are not completely unconscious during the procedure. They drug you up just enough so that you are woozy but not unconscious. If I am not completely unconscious then I don’t want an invasive procedure such as a Colonoscopy.

(2) Some stories are told where a patient is under excruciating pain during the examination and the medical personnel either don’t care or the person is drugged up enough to where they cannot properly communicate to the medical personnel the pain they are having. I don’t like pain and I don’t want to take the chance.

(3) Others have reported that the scope used by the doctor was mis-directed and either caused a deep scratch to their intestines or an actual perforation. In the case of a perforation a surgery needs to be done to repair the damage the doctor and medical personnel caused.

(4) There are many reported cases of the scope not being properly sanitized after being used on one patient and then when they use it on the next patient the new patient contracts an infection.

(5) Here is my final, and the most important one, of my reasons to not have a Colonoscopy done. You have your doctor and they perform the Colonoscopy at a medical facility, so you have to deal with not only your doctor but the medical staff at the clinic where they perform the procedure. In both cases, before they will perform a Colonoscopy on you, they require you to sign a waiver stating you are prohibited from holding your doctor, and the medical personnel at the clinic, responsible for any injury, damage, etc., resulting from them doing something wrong during the procedure. What?

There is no way I would sign a waiver stating I cannot sue my doctor or medical personnel for causing me an injury or infection due to them doing something wrong. I had a family doctor at the time who said to me if my only reason for doing a medical procedure was to sue the doctor or medical personnel if something goes wrong then I should not do the medical procedure. I told my doctor that is not my intention but I would be an idiot to waive all my rights to where if I have a perforated intestine, an infection, or something else debilitating from the medical procedure, any Judge would throw my lawsuit out based on my signature on a legal document stating I am prohibited from suing for malpractice.

So I continue on, currently at 63 years of age, and I refuse to have an invasive procedure such as a Colonoscopy done on me.