Bill Adamson, the poster boy for preventive health screenings, came to the Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm screening day at Eastern Plumas Health Care, only to find out he has a small aneurysm. Because he caught it early, he\u2019ll be able to monitor it through yearly screenings, and have a manageable treatment plan if it increases in size later on. An AAA, if it becomes very large, is like an old bicycle tire with a balloon at a weak point. If it bursts, it is lethal. Said Adamson, \u201cMy mother lived to age 97, and there\u2019s longevity on my father\u2019s side\u2014I have no desire to cash in the chips!\u201d
\nEastern Plumas Health Care\u2019s Saturday Preventive Health Clinic, held every third Saturday of the month, is the brainchild of Dr. Michelle Kim. \u201cIn our busy clinic practice for sick and urgent patients, we don\u2019t often have the time to address health maintenance and the importance of keeping somebody healthy for the future,\u201d she said. The Saturday clinics give EPHC the opportunity to address this, with a different preventive health service highlighted each month. Preventive health care is targeted as an essential health benefit under the Affordable Care Act and, therefore, these tests and screenings are available for free to most insured patients.
\nEach Saturday screening begins with an appointment with Dr. Kim. These appointments are either free to patients or have a small co-payment. At the appointment, Dr. Kim discusses the patients\u2019 risk factors for the preventive service that month, performs a brief accompanying exam, and provides some important education regarding health maintenance and prevention related to that particular health issue (for instance, a breast exam, and discussion of breast health and risk factors accompany the mammography screening).
\nIn the first three months, Saturday Clinics for breast cancer (mammogram), Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm, and bone density (dexascan) have screened 66 patients.
\n\u201cThe whole basis of health maintenance,\u201d she explained, \u201cis taking a healthy person and looking ten years down the line to see what they\u2019ll be at risk for\u2014catching it in the earliest stages before it becomes an emergency. With a ruptured Aortic Aneurysm, it\u2019s game over\u2014it\u2019s lethal.\u201d But, when found early, an AAA is easy to monitor and treat. The importance of these screenings came shining through when one of the patients at the Saturday AAA Clinic showed positive for an aneurysm in its early stages.
\nBill Adamson, agreed to talk about his experience in the hopes that it will encourage others to get screening tests for conditions for which they have significant risk factors (for AAA it\u2019s any male 65 and over who has smoked at least one pack of cigarettes any time in his life). He explained that \u201c[Dr. Kim] gave me a call and told me that I\u2019m pressing a limit on the size of the aneurysm. Today, there\u2019s no need for alarm.\u201d He added that Dr. Kim told him, \u201cIt\u2019s just on that edge of a little bit larger than what we\u2019d like to see, so let\u2019s keep an eye on it.\u201d
\n\u201cIt was a positive experience discovering that . . . it would be my personal recommendation that everybody give themselves a chance to see what\u2019s going on on the inside,\u201d said Adamson, reasoning that people easily go to the doctor for a broken arm, but \u201cif they\u2019ve got something broken on the inside, an enormous amount of people would rather run away than to actually see they\u2019re okay or there\u2019s something there they ought to deal with.\u201d
\nDr. Kim concurs. All of these tests screen for conditions that aren\u2019t obvious through a physical exam. And all, when caught early are treatable, whereas if they\u2019re left untreated, they can be deadly. If she can actually feel an AAA during a physical exam, said Dr. Kim, it\u2019s at the very dangerous stage. \u201cA pulsatile abdominal mass\u2014that means it\u2019s beating like your heart and feels like a balloon in your stomach\u2014that is not a good feeling.\u201d
\nOn the other hand, screening recommendations have evolved over time. The medical profession tries to walk a fine line between over testing and not testing enough, which means potentially missing something that could have saved someone\u2019s life. \u201cWe don\u2019t want to give them more screenings, tests, anxiety, and radiation than needed just to catch the very few.\u201d The AAA test requires no radiation, and contemporary digital mammography and dexascans use very low doses of radiation. Still, health care professionals are pulling back somewhat from previous recommendations\u2014always trying to balance the risks and the benefits. But, it\u2019s a difficult line, Dr. Kim admits, because \u201cyou never want to be on the wrong side,\u201d and miss something vital.
\nAs far as Bill Adamson is concerned, he had nothing to lose and everything to gain. \u201cAt my age, I don\u2019t want to quit. I\u2019m having too much fun being alive. If there\u2019s something there, let\u2019s address it so I can keep on having fun and being alive,\u201d he said. As an added bonus, the test wasn\u2019t uncomfortable, and \u201cI came out on the good side, because they gave me some goodies (granola bars, trail mix, and a travel cup) when it was all over.
\nStaff members volunteer to work on Saturday at the Preventive Clinics. They try to make it special for patients with a raffle prize drawing, healthy snacks, interesting health education materials, and other give away items. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of a fun thing for patients,\u201d said Dr. Kim. \u201cThey\u2019re the only ones in the clinic. It\u2019s about them. It\u2019s an \u2018I\u2019m special today, the clinic\u2019s open just for me\u2019 kind of thing. All staff are there just for that purpose, because we want to be there. The feeling is, \u2018We care about your health too.\u2019 It\u2019s a special day, set aside for a screening test that could help save someone\u2019s life.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bill Adamson, the poster boy for preventive health screenings, came to the Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm screening day at Eastern Plumas Health Care, only to find out he has a small aneurysm. Because he caught it early, he\u2019ll be able to monitor it through yearly screenings, and have a manageable treatment plan if it increases in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ephc.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}