Originally Posted by HawkOwl

The doc explained to me that from an overall point of view the PSA was just too unreliable. I did get a blood draw for one and depending on results I may or may not do something further. As for the manual exam: He confirmed what I've always thought. So much depends on the person who is attached to the finger that manual exams are not nearly the "gold standard" we have been told. Plus, unless the lower colon is pretty clean it is difficult for the provider to tell what is being felt.

THE KEY, to me, is to take responsibility for my own health. When I started doing that I realized that about 90% of the stuff that was labeled food and sold was not good for me. Also, that most of the recommendations for good health had at their heart either or both profit and not my good health. Then I spent a lot of time cutting through the snake oil surrounding health. I found that most medical providers and government folks in the business held a pretty low opinion of the general public. So, most recommendations are minumums rather than desired or even optimal.

In defense of medical and health providers I think this crowd would agree that most people would rather take a pill than do the work to be healthy. Given that background I'm not sure how much guilt I can place on someone for taking advantage of people's proclivities.