Is it okay to ask questions before a diagnosis?
My husband has been ill for 6 weeks. It's literally been like an episode of House. In a nutshell, he had a fever for 23 days for no known reason. During that time he developed random symptoms...a bloated feeling, a sore leg, a cough. They ran a zillion blood tests, a chest X-ray, and chest & abdomen CT. They found portal vein thrombosis. Then his leg pain worsened and they did an ultrasound to find another blood clot. He is a healthy 48 year old with no family history. They put him on warfarin and ran a bunch more tests. He saw an infectious disease guy who sent him to hematology and now to GI.
Today he was diagnosed with microcytic anemia. That, combined with some lab results and symptoms, makes the infectious disease doctor suspect colon cancer. Here's the kicker: my husband has experienced severe rectal bleeding on and off for 12 years, occasionally having external hemorrhoids. He always assumed it was just hemarrhoids and has never had a colonoscopy. Anyway. He's getting one now. The doctor has requested a colonoscopy within the next week or two (they were booked through November and the doctor called them directly to insist it needed to be sooner.). Infectious disease doctor even told us he's worried. (My husband made a joke about "if you're not worried, then I'm not worried". Dr looked him dead in the eye and said "I'm worried.")
We see hematology again on Tuesday. The hematologist is also an oncologist and is in a cancer clinic, so I feel confident that he can advise us Tuesday on the actual chances of colon cancer.
Are there any questions we should ask him?
Thanks for listening.
They have not run a CEA yet as far as I can tell. They did run an AFP but that doesn't seem relevant for colon cancer?