Colon Exclamation

The oncologists of America are up in arms about our unwillingness to let them look up our asses.

Apparently, screening for colorectal cancer is simply not setting the world on fire as a popular leisure time activity, perhaps because of the lingering and entirely accurate associations most people have between colorectal carcinoma screening and letting a doctor take an enormous cold metal instrument in hand and shove it into your buttocks. Only 38% of Americans age 50 and over have ever had a proctoscopic examination for colorectal cancer, which percentage frankly surprises me not because it is so small but because it is so large.

The Journal of the National Cancer Institute (remember them?) journalist was refreshingly frank about this, saying "These dismal [screening] rates appear to be related to fear and loathing." In fact, in one study, people who had never been screened said "they would forfeit a month of life to avoid a flexible sigmoidoscopy [the plastic tube] and up to 3 months to avoid a colonoscopy [metal instruments]." I frankly think these people have their priorities in order. There's plenty of time to look up there after the carcinoma develops.

Fortunately, due to the indefatigable inventiveness of American medical science, the same American medical science that proved using NIH money that drunk mice perform worse on mazes than sober mice, we have a new technique that enables oncologists to look up your ass electronically, not physically. Unfortunately, JNCI uses a rather dark simile to describe this advance: "Just as a player would fly through a video game, zapping enemies, virtual colonoscopy allows researchers to fly through a colon, searching for polyps and abnormalities in the colon wall, without having to insert a scope into the patient's rectum."

I'm just envisioning it:

"NOW...The only computer game that allows you to fly up computer-generated buttockses! Colon is the flying game that combines the sheer kinetic thrills of Quake with the scatologisicm of ‘South Park.' Just like leading cancer scientists and professional perverts, you too can wander around in people's lower lower intestines, zapping tumors with chemotherapy, surgical tools, and the occasional nuclear explosive that you have taken from the aliens which have invaded your ass. Look for the games ‘Stomach,' ‘Esophagus,' and ‘Pineal Gland,' coming out at six-month intervals from OncologiSoft."

I happen to think that the doctors have other motives than the fun of virtually flying through someone's colon in mind when they endorse this procedure, though. I base this on an advertisement on the back of the American Journal of Cardiology, for something called an "isomolar contrast medium." The top part of the advertisement has a man who is somewhat pumped and very pissed-looking, and who has taken his glasses off, presumably in preparation to fight whomever is behind the camera, like many a man would if someone had just insulted his mother. The caption next to it reads, "Bob won't tolerate a painful procedure." The message seems to be, "Sure, I may have a potentially fatal cardiac condition, but if diagnosing it hurts in any way I'll kick your ass." This is by no means the most ludicrous medical advertisement I have ever seen, but that's another column. The point is that perhaps doctors may be encouraging this new noninvasive procedure after receiving similar physical threats.

Or perhaps doctors are reluctant to continue sticking things up into the lower colon for fear that it will encourage more people like one 27-year old Austrian male who lived with his parents. According to the American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology, this man died with an electrode in his rectum, connected to a car battery, and the other electrode in his hand. And an enormous electrical scar on his chest. And a sock on his penis. And a bunch of pornographic literature strewn around the room. Did I mention he was completely naked except for the sock?

Apparently he was a victim of the mortifyingly embarrassing syndrome of "premature electrification" when he accidentally completed the circuit to his chest, causing "myocardial infibrillation," or a "heart attack from electricity," to translate. (And bedwetting is "nocturnal enuresis," and impotence is"erectile dysfunction.") What I'm saying is, maybe this guy, having nothing better to do with his time thanks to the famously generous Austrian welfare system, might have gone in for a colonoscopy and thought, "Hey, this is kinda fun, but it needs a little spice." And then tragedy resulted. All this time, and he could have been playing "Colon" at home, and using the Internet like all good-hearted pervert losers. Although where you put the modem cord is still a question medical science has not been able to solve.

Journal Club Home

Humor Home

Spam-O-Matic Home