Prostate Cancer

Do you mind describing how the biopsy was,for other people?

No it was conducted by the nurse who did the scans on me, the smaller scans, not the big body one and she said 'Well,' she said 'This may, you may feel a sensation here,' she said 'we are going to like prick you,' and she explained taking out a little core. She said 'I'll explain exactly what it is,' she said, and I forget to be honest how many places, it may be have been 3 or it may have been 6, something like that. And yes I did feel like a puncture but very, very quick, a slight discomfort and they also gave me some antibiotic tablets to take because they said because we have punctured it, there will be some bleeding, don't worry, that's what it is, it's the puncture, it may last for 2 or 3 days.

So that wasn't too uncomfortable?

Oh no, no, no I was, it was no worse than a wasp sting or something like that, no agony, no writhing around.
 

It was very painful, in fact I had to have a lay down after it. I think I might have been a bit of a wimp, I don't know because other people didn't, they found it very uncomfortable, but they didn't seem to need a second sort of resting session whereas I felt, I think the whole series of events that has happened through this I think that the biopsy was the worst thing I had. And obviously it's not a big deal or anything like that but it was, it was painful. I think may be it's because you've got the sound of the sort of snip and what have you, you know, and I mean it's to you but anyway I found that very, very unpleasant, very, very unpleasant.
 

The biopsy itself was interesting, well I find it interesting because I'd had a chat with my elder brother who'd gone down the same path, you know 10 days earlier, and gone to the same team and I said, “How did you find it?” And he said, “Oh, you won't worry at all, uncomfortable at the worst.” And so I went along feeling, you know, pretty relaxed about it, and my own view was that I had always had a very much higher pain threshold than my brother and was much more pain tolerant. So I thought if he just thought it really was hardly worth calling discomfort it would be exactly the same for me. But in fact it was very painful. I was quite surprised how painful it was. The sort of pain that made you, you know you're lying there all bundled together in the fetal position and one shot up as the pain... and I think the amount of pain people get depends on the size of the prostate, how much distension there is, and how much bleeding there is. If you get bleeding into quite a big prostate you get the capsule stretched and then you do get pain. If you've got a smallish prostate or if you don't bleed [the pain will be less]. I hadn't stopped bleeding from my prostate by the time I had the surgery, whatever it was, three weeks later. I still had haematuria [blood in urine], I still had haemospermia [blood in sperm] and so I think it was the bleeding into the prostate which gives rise to the pain.

That was quite unpleasant and surprising?

Well, one didn't show it after the first initial surprise, but yes, it was unpleasant. I certainly wouldn't suggest that people didn't have trans-rectal ultrasound and biopsy because of it, but one realised in some people it is not terribly easy. And when a few years later I was involved in a research project and the surgeon said in a jolly way, “Well, I think we'll take 36 biopsies from each man” I just said, “Oh no, that's not happening on any account.” 

Can you explain a little bit more about the biopsy, what was that like please?

The biopsy I went down the road and it was done you know sort of the next day, everything was done very fast. The PSA test before I had the results of the PSA test the biopsy, I didn't like it, it's a thoroughly unpleasant business but it's quick and sharp and it doesn't last long and I think that my tolerance for that sort of test whatever you'd like to call it is fairly good er judging from the way doctors have responded. I think some people don't like it, it's not something I liked.