The Lockerbie Bomber and the British cancer drug
Discussion
Soovy said:
So, this mudering son on a b1tch gets a British developed cancer drug, which isn't available in Britain, while I had to watch my Dad die in agony from Prostate Cancer.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...
You could not make this up.
I despair.
Sorry to hear about your Dad. Unfortunately, all I can offer is that losing your Dad is hard. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...
You could not make this up.
I despair.
Edited by anonymous-user on Saturday 20th August 19:20
Soovy said:
So, this mudering son on a b1tch gets a British developed cancer drug, which isn't available in Britain, while I had to watch my Dad die in agony from Prostate Cancer.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...
You could not make this up.
I despair.
You would be the first person wanting to sue someone if it went wrong though...http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...
You could not make this up.
I despair.
Having been in Soovy's position - helplessly watching my father die in agony - I can say that once you know your father is dieing, sueing the hospital is the last thing on your mind. You just want him to recover.
I would not resent my father's doctors had they a) been competent and b) given a s
t about him. Indeed, his last consultant was competent and I hold him in high regard. Sadly his intervention was too late.
Had Soovy's father been offered the treatment it would have been as some kind of "last chance saloon" and his family would not have sued if the treatment had failed.
That said, drugs are licenced for a reason, and it is right that unlicenced drugs are not administered.
BTW Soovey, I should have offered my sympathy in my original reply. Unfortunately I know how it feels to loose my father: it is raw for me even after two years.
I would not resent my father's doctors had they a) been competent and b) given a s
t about him. Indeed, his last consultant was competent and I hold him in high regard. Sadly his intervention was too late.Had Soovy's father been offered the treatment it would have been as some kind of "last chance saloon" and his family would not have sued if the treatment had failed.
That said, drugs are licenced for a reason, and it is right that unlicenced drugs are not administered.
BTW Soovey, I should have offered my sympathy in my original reply. Unfortunately I know how it feels to loose my father: it is raw for me even after two years.
dbdb said:
I suspect that the release of al-Megrahi was politically motivated, but that he was also very ill at the time. Life expectancy is very difficult to measure accurately and it may well be the case that if al-Megrahi had received his cancer treatment in Britain he would have only lived a few months more.
My father had prostate cancer at about the same time; his appearance and particularly his gait were very similar to al-Megrahi at the time he was released. My father lived another two months.
It is difficult to exaggerate how abysmal my father’s treatment on the NHS was, how incompetent the many doctors who saw him were and how disinterested all the medical personnel - whether doctors or nurses, who dealt with his case were. They really didn’t care whether my dad lived or died.
In the end when it became apparent even to the fools who were treating him that my father’s condition would be fatal, the various hospitals which had been “treating” him entered into a gruesome merry-go-round, discharging him in the hope he would die somewhere else.
Whether or not the NHS offers the full array of available drugs is only part of the problem. Sadly, the diagnostic ability of many doctors in the UK is so poor that the condition is not treated through wrong diagnosis.
My father was such a case. His autopsy revealed a prostate tumour the size of a small melon, and despite having had prostate cancer before, his consultants failed to diagnose cancer at all – believing him to have “some kind of auto immune disease”. He had all the tests; they just couldn’t read the results. I did better Googling his symptoms.
If al-Megrahi had received his treatment at the same hospitals as my dad, I do not doubt that he would now be dead. The UK has some of the worst cancer survival rates in the developed world. Results for other serious illnesses are no better and make sobering reading. Get health insurance.
Your comment to get health insurance. One assumes you live in the UK and as your health insurance won't cover you overseas and the private sector uses the NHS doctors, since it doesn't train any of it's own, those would be the same doctors with poor diagnostic ability you're trying to avoid by using your health insurance who will be treating you.My father had prostate cancer at about the same time; his appearance and particularly his gait were very similar to al-Megrahi at the time he was released. My father lived another two months.
It is difficult to exaggerate how abysmal my father’s treatment on the NHS was, how incompetent the many doctors who saw him were and how disinterested all the medical personnel - whether doctors or nurses, who dealt with his case were. They really didn’t care whether my dad lived or died.
In the end when it became apparent even to the fools who were treating him that my father’s condition would be fatal, the various hospitals which had been “treating” him entered into a gruesome merry-go-round, discharging him in the hope he would die somewhere else.
Whether or not the NHS offers the full array of available drugs is only part of the problem. Sadly, the diagnostic ability of many doctors in the UK is so poor that the condition is not treated through wrong diagnosis.
My father was such a case. His autopsy revealed a prostate tumour the size of a small melon, and despite having had prostate cancer before, his consultants failed to diagnose cancer at all – believing him to have “some kind of auto immune disease”. He had all the tests; they just couldn’t read the results. I did better Googling his symptoms.
If al-Megrahi had received his treatment at the same hospitals as my dad, I do not doubt that he would now be dead. The UK has some of the worst cancer survival rates in the developed world. Results for other serious illnesses are no better and make sobering reading. Get health insurance.
Are the BUPA cancer survival rates any better then the NHS? Who knows, as far as i am aware BUPA don't publish them but i bet they're not because if they were then i'm sure they would be very proud of them. They do say in the advert that you get to see the specialist sooner, although the nhs gets you seen within 2 weeks if they're worried about cancer. The real problem with cancer is the delay to presentation which is normally years from the cancer developing to producing symptoms. The adverts also say you get a nice room, which is good.
Abiraterone is not licensed in the UK yet, so once again your health insurance would't cover it. At £30k even if it does and you need in when you're young enough to have health insurance ( rates go through the roof at 60) i'm not sure the insurance sector will be willing to pay to give you an extra 3 months of life, but we'll see.
The best bit about being a pathologist is that you're nearly always right with the diagnosis, just always too late.
piquet said:
dbdb said:
I suspect that the release of al-Megrahi was politically motivated, but that he was also very ill at the time. Life expectancy is very difficult to measure accurately and it may well be the case that if al-Megrahi had received his cancer treatment in Britain he would have only lived a few months more.
My father had prostate cancer at about the same time; his appearance and particularly his gait were very similar to al-Megrahi at the time he was released. My father lived another two months.
It is difficult to exaggerate how abysmal my father’s treatment on the NHS was, how incompetent the many doctors who saw him were and how disinterested all the medical personnel - whether doctors or nurses, who dealt with his case were. They really didn’t care whether my dad lived or died.
In the end when it became apparent even to the fools who were treating him that my father’s condition would be fatal, the various hospitals which had been “treating” him entered into a gruesome merry-go-round, discharging him in the hope he would die somewhere else.
Whether or not the NHS offers the full array of available drugs is only part of the problem. Sadly, the diagnostic ability of many doctors in the UK is so poor that the condition is not treated through wrong diagnosis.
My father was such a case. His autopsy revealed a prostate tumour the size of a small melon, and despite having had prostate cancer before, his consultants failed to diagnose cancer at all – believing him to have “some kind of auto immune disease”. He had all the tests; they just couldn’t read the results. I did better Googling his symptoms.
If al-Megrahi had received his treatment at the same hospitals as my dad, I do not doubt that he would now be dead. The UK has some of the worst cancer survival rates in the developed world. Results for other serious illnesses are no better and make sobering reading. Get health insurance.
Your comment to get health insurance. One assumes you live in the UK and as your health insurance won't cover you overseas and the private sector uses the NHS doctors, since it doesn't train any of it's own, those would be the same doctors with poor diagnostic ability you're trying to avoid by using your health insurance who will be treating you.My father had prostate cancer at about the same time; his appearance and particularly his gait were very similar to al-Megrahi at the time he was released. My father lived another two months.
It is difficult to exaggerate how abysmal my father’s treatment on the NHS was, how incompetent the many doctors who saw him were and how disinterested all the medical personnel - whether doctors or nurses, who dealt with his case were. They really didn’t care whether my dad lived or died.
In the end when it became apparent even to the fools who were treating him that my father’s condition would be fatal, the various hospitals which had been “treating” him entered into a gruesome merry-go-round, discharging him in the hope he would die somewhere else.
Whether or not the NHS offers the full array of available drugs is only part of the problem. Sadly, the diagnostic ability of many doctors in the UK is so poor that the condition is not treated through wrong diagnosis.
My father was such a case. His autopsy revealed a prostate tumour the size of a small melon, and despite having had prostate cancer before, his consultants failed to diagnose cancer at all – believing him to have “some kind of auto immune disease”. He had all the tests; they just couldn’t read the results. I did better Googling his symptoms.
If al-Megrahi had received his treatment at the same hospitals as my dad, I do not doubt that he would now be dead. The UK has some of the worst cancer survival rates in the developed world. Results for other serious illnesses are no better and make sobering reading. Get health insurance.
Are the BUPA cancer survival rates any better then the NHS? Who knows, as far as i am aware BUPA don't publish them but i bet they're not because if they were then i'm sure they would be very proud of them. They do say in the advert that you get to see the specialist sooner, although the nhs gets you seen within 2 weeks if they're worried about cancer. The real problem with cancer is the delay to presentation which is normally years from the cancer developing to producing symptoms. The adverts also say you get a nice room, which is good.
Abiraterone is not licensed in the UK yet, so once again your health insurance would't cover it. At £30k even if it does and you need in when you're young enough to have health insurance ( rates go through the roof at 60) i'm not sure the insurance sector will be willing to pay to give you an extra 3 months of life, but we'll see.
The best bit about being a pathologist is that you're nearly always right with the diagnosis, just always too late.
I too suspect the private health sector health outcomes are little better. An ordinary individual has no way of determining whether the doctor he is paying will be better than the doctor he is allocated by the NHS. He will however have more access to the doctor.
I am confident though that if the average outcome of a privately treated patient is better, then advertising would inform us of this - and it does not.
The NHS claim that a patient suspected of having cancer will be seen within two weeks may be true, but depends on the initial doctor being capable of a correct diagnosis, and that any subsequent doctor is also capable of recognising symptoms. My father had many classic symptoms and scans taken over a year before his death clearly showed his condition, but none of the doctors who read the scans recognised it.
Incidentally, my father needed two autopsies since the first was not conducted properly. The second was however, and very detailed and candid.
I recognise that Abiraterone is not yet licensed in the UK, so health insurance will not cover it.
In a lot of cases all Private gets you is a nicer room and the Consultant doing what a junior would do if you where NHS, if you really need a consultant whether you are private or NHS you will get one, of course this could mean the consultant the private patient expects is actually doing real work with an NHS patient.
chim said:
One thing I have learned, when a Doctor in this country tells you that there is no hope, go home and prepare to push up daises. DON'T BELIEVE THE tt. Get on the web and you will find a host of available treatments in countries that are far poorer than ours, many of these treatments can cure/prolong life. Just our fking st system that makes them unavailable and our doctors will not even hint at the existence of them. 
Prob the wrong thread but as you mention it.t. Get on the web and you will find a host of available treatments in countries that are far poorer than ours, many of these treatments can cure/prolong life. Just our fking st system that makes them unavailable and our doctors will not even hint at the existence of them. Give us a pointer to some sites than ?
If you were in the above situation would you seriously consider giving homeopathy a go in conjunction with ' traditional' medicine ?
speedyguy said:
chim said:
One thing I have learned, when a Doctor in this country tells you that there is no hope, go home and prepare to push up daises. DON'T BELIEVE THE tt. Get on the web and you will find a host of available treatments in countries that are far poorer than ours, many of these treatments can cure/prolong life. Just our fking st system that makes them unavailable and our doctors will not even hint at the existence of them.
Prob the wrong thread but as you mention it.t. Get on the web and you will find a host of available treatments in countries that are far poorer than ours, many of these treatments can cure/prolong life. Just our fking st system that makes them unavailable and our doctors will not even hint at the existence of them. Give us a pointer to some sites than ?
If you were in the above situation would you seriously consider giving homeopathy a go in conjunction with ' traditional' medicine ?
MartyPubes said:
No, he's getting upset that the NHS wont fork out tens of thousands of pounds on a treatment which may prolong life by a month or two. Probably the sort of character who endlessly parrots 'You can't put a price on life!' without realising that that is exactly what happens in dozens of situations every day.
I just love it when some random poster pops and decides that he knows the type of person you are from 100 typed words on one very narrow subject, even better when they arrogant enough to start throwing insults around in attempt to look superior, when in actual fact it only shows them up for the narrow minded idiots they actually are.When you have watched your mother die in pain purely because of NHS dictates on drugs please feel free to post sanctimonious bulls
t. When you have watched you father die slowly and had to suffer the endless rounds of useless Doctors that are far to busy to care less let alone diagnose the actual problem then please feel free to act like a superior tt.In short, when you have experienced the full ineptitude of the NHS in all its Glory time and time again come back to me with your idiot comments.
The NHS is a failed organisation, it tries to be all things to all men and is drowning under its own vast bulk. It is mired in endless conflicting Government policies. It is full of well meaning people that have became exceptionally disillusioned with the system they are trying to work in. To many patients with far to few resources.
Do I think spending a few grand to extend someone's life by a couple of months is good value, probably not, do I think a system that correctly diagnoses patients problems quickly, administers the correct treatment path, allows access to the most effective drugs and procedures for there problems and thus gives the patient the highest chance of survival or quality of final days is worth fighting for. Hell yes
Now crawl back into your box
TheEnd said:
So what is the general consensus?
He never had cancer in the first place and it was all made up?
Are people upset that he's buying an unlicensed drug from a different country?
You can't have it both ways, either he is being kept alive by some wonder drug and released on compassionate grounds, or he never had it in the first place so maybe this drug doesn't do anything at all.
Who needs it 'both ways'?He never had cancer in the first place and it was all made up?
Are people upset that he's buying an unlicensed drug from a different country?
You can't have it both ways, either he is being kept alive by some wonder drug and released on compassionate grounds, or he never had it in the first place so maybe this drug doesn't do anything at all.
The truth is that the Government wanted him released for political reasons, since proven meaningless. As a Country, we were shown to have no morals in making this decision and by the outcome, we have been shown to be fools as well.
The cancer, which he may or may not have, and personally, I couldn't care less whether he has it or not, or whether he lives or dies, was a very convenient excuse for letting him out, in order to satisfy the political imperatives seen by our 'leaders' at that time.
It's based on a lot of people saying he's getting it easy, when in reality, he has got cancer, and will die from it in the near future.
Sooner than the end of his sentence.
I'd bet he'd happily swap cancer for the remainder of his sentence in a UK prison.
When it was first said he was getting released, a lot of people thought the cancer thing was a sham, and he'd make a miraculous recovery shortly after.
Now it's swapped to the big problem being he is on more of an experimental drug which at best might increase his life by 3-6 months.
I know people think he should rot in jail, despite the obvious hygiene problems with that, but his life sentence is now a death sentence, so I don't see the harm in letting him lie in a hospital bed instead.
Sooner than the end of his sentence.
I'd bet he'd happily swap cancer for the remainder of his sentence in a UK prison.
When it was first said he was getting released, a lot of people thought the cancer thing was a sham, and he'd make a miraculous recovery shortly after.
Now it's swapped to the big problem being he is on more of an experimental drug which at best might increase his life by 3-6 months.
I know people think he should rot in jail, despite the obvious hygiene problems with that, but his life sentence is now a death sentence, so I don't see the harm in letting him lie in a hospital bed instead.
When the UN observer at the trial says the court's decision is a "spectacular miscarriage of justice", then something is wrong with the original verdict.
When the only journo to sit through the trial easily rips it to tiny shreds, then there's something wrong with the verdict.
When the 1 prosecution witness cannot id the suspect, then there's something wrong with the verdict.
When the timer used could not have been responsible, then there's something wrong with the verdict.
When the FBI expert who finds the one piece of crucial evidence is sacked for evidence-tampering in a subsequent trial, then there's... well, you know.
And on, and on, and on.....
Soov, it's a sham, always was a sham and always will be a sham trial.
When the only journo to sit through the trial easily rips it to tiny shreds, then there's something wrong with the verdict.
When the 1 prosecution witness cannot id the suspect, then there's something wrong with the verdict.
When the timer used could not have been responsible, then there's something wrong with the verdict.
When the FBI expert who finds the one piece of crucial evidence is sacked for evidence-tampering in a subsequent trial, then there's... well, you know.
And on, and on, and on.....
Soov, it's a sham, always was a sham and always will be a sham trial.
Soovy said:
So, this mudering son on a b1tch gets a British developed cancer drug, which isn't available in Britain, while I had to watch my Dad die in agony from Prostate Cancer.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...
You could not make this up.
I despair.
There was no evidence he actually DID anything, but don't let the facts get in the way of a good rant, eh...http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...
You could not make this up.
I despair.
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