Trust your doctor's guidance or trust your own instincts—it's a dilemma that many of us face, and honestly, it can feel like choosing between a rock and a hard place. In this episode, we dive deep into that very question, weighing the merits of medical advice against our gut feelings, especially when something feels off. With a captivating blend of personal anecdotes and thoughtful insights, we explore the landscape of health awareness, particularly for women, and the importance of proactive measures like low-dose chest CT scans. Our guest, who has a family steeped in medicine, shares her journey through a lung cancer diagnosis that caught her completely off guard despite her active lifestyle. We have a fun game at the end where we unpack the trade-offs between early detection and the anxiety of over-diagnosis, because let’s be real, navigating health can sometimes feel like a high-stakes game of Jenga. So, grab your headphones and join us for a thought-provoking discussion filled with witty banter and some serious takeaways! The episode culminates in a heartfelt call to action for listeners, particularly women, to take charge of their health narratives. Speaker B's journey through a lung cancer diagnosis serves as a catalyst for urging others to pursue preventive measures like low-dose chest CT scans. As they share insights from her book, "One Scan Saved My Life," the importance of education and awareness in combating health fears becomes evident. The speakers encourage a culture of open dialogue around health issues, stressing that knowledge is power and urging listeners to involve friends and family in their health journeys. Their discussion is not just about health; it's about community, support, and the collective effort to navigate the complexities of medical care. With a blend of humor and earnestness, they leave listeners with a sense of urgency and empowerment, highlighting that taking proactive steps today could lead to healthier tomorrows.

Takeaways:

• Trusting your instincts can sometimes be more powerful than solely relying on medical advice, especially when something feels off.
• Having a mindset that believes in health while acknowledging risks can be a balancing act that shapes our health journey.
• Early detection of health issues can be a double-edged sword, with the potential for over-treatment and anxiety looming large.
• Humor can play a crucial role in coping with serious health challenges, as it lightens the emotional load we carry.
• Women over 40, especially those with family histories of certain conditions, should advocate for more inclusive screening guidelines.
• Maintaining a proactive approach to health, including regular check-ups and screenings, is essential for effective illness prevention and management.

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Trust your doctor's guidance or trust your own instinct when something feels off, which one fails you more often?

I'm the daughter of two doctors and the sister of two more, and I love them more than anything.

And I go to them for guidance and then I do what I think is right with my own instinct.

Live believing you're healthy or live knowing something could be missed.

Which mindset is more dangerous?

Living thinking something could be missed is definitely more dangerous.

I went into that scan and I was like, look at me, I just ran six miles.

My hair is sweaty.

I'm so healthy.

And they were like, you have lung cancer.

I was like, wrong person.

Have you met me?

Okay, so we always like to wrap up the show with a game if you're would like to play.

Okay.

This one is called okay, this game is called the Trade off.

So I'm basically going to read two scenarios to you and you tell me which one you would go for.

Okay.

There's no wrong, wrong answer.

So feel free to just tell me what you think.

Would you rather that people go in and get testing and try to find these cancers early or avoid unnecessary scans, anxiety and over diagnosis?

That's fair.

I would rather you go get a low dose chest ct. That's what I want.

I don't want you to get a full body mri.

I don't want you to go down a huge rabbit hole.

I want you to get a low dose chest ct, know that a nodule or something's gonna pop up because, like, our skin has freckles, our lungs do too, and then wait a year if you want and follow up again to see if any of them grew.

But I would rather you go get that low dose chest CT number two,.

Expand screening to people who don't meet current guidelines or keep guidelines strict to avoid overwhelming the system.

Which one would you choose?

I would like to see guidelines expanded to at least include people with a family history or workplace or breast cancer survivors.

I also would like to say that people that are smokers and do meet guidelines, less than 20% of them are getting scanned.

So don't worry about the stigma.

Don't be embarrassed when you go in there to go get the scan.

Go get the scan.

Yes.

This is very important.

Okay.

Trust your doctor's guidance or trust your own instinct when something feels off, which one fails you more often?

I think women in their 40s and 50s know it all, and I think we feel it and know.

And I think I'm the daughter of two doctors and the sister of two more and I love them more than anything and I go to them for guidance and then I do what I think is right with my own instinct, with my children health and my health.

Yeah, you kind of.

Ultimately it's so important, I think, listen to your gut.

Right.

Something feels off.

Like do something.

Right.

Yeah.

Right.

Live believing you're healthy or live knowing something could be missed.

Which mindset is more dangerous?

Living thinking something could be missed is definitely more dangerous.

I live like I'm the healthiest person in the world.

I mean, I went into that scan and I was like, look at me, I just ran six miles.

My hair is sweaty, I'm so healthy.

And they were like, you have lung cancer.

I was like, wrong person.

Have you met me?

So I live like I'm the healthiest person in the world and even though I had lung cancer five months ago, I am still the healthiest person in the world and I still believe that and I take care of myself and I don't stress or have anxiety about it.

Yeah, there's no point to stress.

Right.

You've done everything you can do, you know, it's like.

And you're doing the right things and I can't believe it was only five months ago.

I know.

Yeah.

There was a reason, lady.

There was a reason for you.

Early detection that might lead to over treatment or later detection that might limit your options, which is the bigger risk.

That gets asked a lot.

I think later treatment that limits your options is the bigger risk because if it had spread all over, it'd be too late.

But I also think getting those scans and things like that, you cannot go down a rabbit hole.

You have to be calm and not anxious.

You have to listen to doctors at that point to make the right decision.

I think there's a lot of ways that our low dose chest CTs are doing that by having an even noisier view.

And so you only see bigger issues and also telling people to come back in six to 12 months to see if anything grew versus going in that day and really attacking it.

A lot of times when people go in that day, it's because there's an anxiety behind it and we have to just take a deep breath and let it happen.

Yeah, it seems like you dealt with a lot of it through humor, you know, which, which probably was helpful.

Right.

Like, you know, kind of tamps down maybe the anxiety and things like that.

Yeah, right.

I mean, my book, my mother in law was reading my book the other day.

We were at the beach and I was, she was just sitting there And I turned over and she was laughing.

I'm like, you're reading a lung cancer book.

And she was like, it's really funny, you know, but it's funny because, like, my kids knew I had cancer because their dad picked them up.

Like, that's hilarious.

Why has my husband never picked them up from school?

Like, I never realized it.

Now we got to change that.

That's funny that they knew there was a problem because their dad picked them up, right?

I mean, that says a lot, right?

You're like, honey, you'll be doing carpool.

Like, a lot more.

Like, that line was brutal.

I'm like, yeah, welcome to my life every freaking day.

Equal access to baseline scans for everyone or prioritize resources for those statistically high risk.

Is fairness the same as effectiveness?

Look, I think that we are missing all of the high risk people, so we should give it to them first.

But I think that the guidelines need to change and maybe capture women over the age of 40 like we do with mammograms, because I think we're higher risk than we had originally thought.

Also.

Yeah, that just blows me away.

I mean, I can't even believe that it's crazy.

Be the calm, reassuring mom or be the hyper, aware, proactive one who questions everything.

How does this experience change who you are?

So it's interesting.

My mom is a pediatrician, and she is not an alarmist pediatrician, which has helped me to be more of the calm, reassuring moment from the beginning.

So a lot of people say, like, oh, your mom's a pediatrician?

I would ask her 500 questions a day as the kids were growing up.

And I don't.

She's very calm.

She's like, everything's okay.

If you feel like it's not, let's address it.

And so, you know, when I.

My kids have had health hiccups along the way, it was my instinct that was like, this isn't right.

Let's address the situation.

But for the most part, I try to be the calm, reassuring moment.

Okay, that's good to know.

And last one.

A system that avoids unnecessary intervention or a system that risks doing too much but misses less.

Which system would have saved more lives?

That's a really hard one.

That's tough.

I think that I'm a big believer in being proactive and working on having preventative care by, like, eating right and exercising and taking care of our bodies.

But so when I did the full body mri, for example, I didn't go down the rabbit hole to check everything.

Obviously, I didn't even check anything for a little while.

But I tried to just look at what was the most important and not go down a hole of like, oh my God, there might be arthritis in my back.

Should I have some surgery on my back to fix it?

I just was like, I'm in my 40s, it's okay.

We're all aging, we're going to be okay.

And so I think it's a fine balance.

And I have friends that have a lot more anxiety about their health.

And for them, I don't recommend them getting a full body mri.

I would just say to do a low dose ct, know that there's going to be something, know that you're going to wait a year and do something else because they can't handle that anxiety around it.

I think I can handle it.

And I think having being the daughter of doctors, I can handle it because I have them to fall back on to ask all those questions.

Yeah, absolutely.

What would you want every woman who's listening right now to know about your story and about lung cancer and about what they should do?

I would love them to go get a low dose chest ct.

I would love them to read my book called One Scan Saved My Life and it'll educate them a lot.

And I would love them to take a friend and their mom to go get a low dose chest CT or read the book just to educate yourself so that you know that it is a risk and tell their friends who are breast cancer survivors to get a check too.