TC Self-Check Time

A timely reminder at Blackfive, one day short of 4 years since I lost my left one.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23, 2008

Important information about testicular cancer and self-exams

Ok, this is an unusual post. But it's really important because we see quite a few cases of testicular cancer at Landstuhl due to the gender/age group of the patients.

Please help raise awareness about the importance of deployed men doing testicular self-exams.

There's very high awareness for breast cancer and the need for women to carry out self-exams.

However, there's much less awareness about testicular cancer (TC), which is the most common type of cancer affecting guys between the ages of 15 and 35.

Most often, TC is found by men themselves. The thing with being deployed is that you don't want to look like you're playing with yourself in the shower or whatever while checking yourself out. Also, back home, it's often found by wives/girlfriends.

But a monthly self-exam of the testicles is the best way of becoming familiar with your body and thus enabling detection of TC at an early - and highly curable - stage.

Information about self-exams. [http://tcrc.acor.org/tcexam.html]

General information about TC. [http://tcrc.acor.org/index.html]

Important to Know:
- TC has a VERY high cure rate.
- Treatment usually involves removal of the affected testicle and follow up.
- Having one testicle is almost always sufficient to keep everything "working".

Finally, embarrassment is a poor excuse for not having things checked out. If you think there is something wrong or something has changed, get your butt to sick call!

Headless Blogger says, "Check them out! Both of them."