ST LOUIS PARK, Minn. — Dr. Tim Myers recently turned 50 and knew that age, combined with family history, meant it was time for a check-in with his doctor.
Dr. Myers is a pathologist at Park Nicollet.
"My mother and one of my aunts had colon polyps that were large enough to have a surgical excision," Dr. Myers said. "I decided to go for a colonoscopy."
Dr. Myers' colonoscopy found four polyps. One was quite large.
"The polyp was large enough that it could have been cancer," Dr. Myers said.
Dr. Thomas Maust, Park Nicollet Gastroenterologist, was the doctor who performed Dr. Myers' colonoscopy.
"A polyp is generally like a little wart or a mole in the colon," Dr. Maust said.
The beauty of a colonoscopy is, when polyps are found, they can be taken out right then and there.
"On the smaller polyps we use forceps, or biopsy forceps," Dr. Maust said. "It is a little set of jaws that goes out and grabs the smaller ones."
The whole experience, from the pre-screening bowel cleanse to the actual procedure was not the ordeal Dr. Myers expected.
"It's not as bad as you think," Dr. Myers said. "It was a couple minutes long, I didn't feel any pain."
Tim's recovery time was minimal, although a number of factors contribute to that.
"The recovery depends on how many polyps were removed and how big they are," Dr. Maust said. "If they are standard, regular, small, medium sized polyps, the recovery is the same as if there were no polyps removed at all."
With the size, location and number of polyps found during Dr. Myers' colonoscopy, he's scheduled for a follow up screening in three years.
"I feel a little bit fortunate that I didn't wait until I was 51 or 52 to have screening colonoscopy because then I may have had cancer at that point," Dr. Myers said.
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