If I Had Not Listened to Doctors I Would Not Be Alive; If I Had Listened Entirely to Doctors I Would Not Be Alive Either

If I had not listened to doctors I would not be alive; if I had listened entirely to doctors I would not be alive either. ——Veteran cancer fighter Brother Bin

Brother Bin was a veteran liver-cancer fighter I once wrote about, who fought liver cancer for eleven years. His nickname on Sina Blog and Sina Weibo is Tairan Yusheng (Serene Remaining Years). He also wrote a post under the same name on Tianya Hospital recording his anti-cancer journey. Eleven years of fighting cancer tempered his heart to the stillness of an ancient well, and forged his special wisdom. For several years we were together morning and night in the same QQ group; he often consulted me on TCM anti-cancer questions, though in fact, through long illness he had become his own physician, no less capable than any liver-cancer specialist.

I rarely use Weibo because it wastes too much time. Only after Brother Bin passed away did I gradually see some of the writings on his blog and Weibo. This title is from one of his Weibo posts. I can say this: no liver-cancer specialist would dare claim to know liver cancer much more deeply than a patient who has had it for eleven years. Because of the will to survive, these patients themselves keep studying liver-cancer knowledge; they have long been specialists themselves.

Brother Bin's words are very representative, and they are also one of the important survival principles I have seen among long-lived cancer patients over the years. There was once an oncologist whose online name was Tan Yi Lun Dao, with whom I spent time online morning and night for several years, discussing tumor treatment. Once he told me that, on the question of cancer, doctors have no more right to speak than patients. I deeply relate to this. As a medical problem, cancer is a problem the global medical community has not yet solved; that is, professional doctors have likewise not found a thorough way to solve cancer. So by what right does an oncologist necessarily feel he is so much better than the patient?

Up to now, medicine has only found partial ways to deal with tumors. Whether these ways are good or bad for the patient is quite hard to judge. Some patients, had they not been treated by professional oncologists, I believe could have lived longer. Of course, in more cases, oncologists' help to tumor patients is still meaningful. But even so, the doctor cannot be with the patient 24 hours a day, cannot deeply know the patient's psychological and physical state, and based on only the dozens of minutes (some even only minutes) of consultation, the advice offered may not truly suit the patient. Under current medical conditions, what doctors say must indeed be taken with a grain of salt. If a patient blindly believes a certain doctor's words, he can easily be treated to death.

The patient's experience after treatment is something the doctor cannot truly feel. Whether the patient's body adapts to the treatment or not, the doctor may not judge accurately. Some doctors, only after they themselves get cancer and undergo surgery, chemoradiotherapy, or drug treatment by other doctors, deeply feel the suffering of the patients they treated in the past. A patient in the course of treatment easily collapses physically and mentally and dies quickly. Cancer treatment should be moderate; the degree of this moderation should actually be grasped by the patient, not by the doctor.

The presence of a tumor does not cause immediate death. The treatment to eliminate the tumor can, on the contrary, cause the patient to die quickly. When the patient's body cannot bear it, many oncologists, judging only from textbook theory, feel the patient can endure more treatment, and so advise him to persist; as a result, some patients die unnaturally. There is a lung-cancer patient called Yuyao Xiangxiaren whose blog records his struggle with lung cancer. Like Brother Bin, he took the doctors' advice with a grain of salt; he took Iressa on and off rather than continuously as the doctors advised. As a result, resistance to Iressa did not develop as early as in typical patients, and he lived longer instead.

Another liver-cancer patient has survived for more than four years; he also writes a blog on Sina. His blog name is Xiuxian Ren (Leisurely Person). One of his blog posts, linked here: http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_c562b3210102vuyk.html, specifically discusses his observations and thoughts on whether one should listen to doctors. I think this kind of observation and thought is meaningful and representative, and I recommend my readers read it and, like him, think about this question. In the specific course of treatment, fully consider your own physical condition, learn more about cancer, see more of other patients' shared experiences, and do not act blindly.

I have a very simple piece of advice on this question: look more, listen more, think more, and fuss less. When choosing a treatment plan, be cautious; do not rush to decide, and especially do not rush from one treatment straight to the next battlefield. That is almost seeking death.