Jade Goody's cancer is terminal
RIP Jade:
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090214/ten-jade-goody-plans-to-wed-jack-tweed-5f8abb3.html
A friend sent me the following text message joke today:
==========================================================
Jade Goody and Patrick Swayze are going to star together in a Christmas panto this year.
NO THEY'RE NOT!
==========================================================
Not in the best possible taste...
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090214/ten-jade-goody-plans-to-wed-jack-tweed-5f8abb3.html
A friend sent me the following text message joke today:
==========================================================
Jade Goody and Patrick Swayze are going to star together in a Christmas panto this year.
NO THEY'RE NOT!
==========================================================
Not in the best possible taste...
Post edited by BigBadMick on
Comments
She did surprisingly well after BB and milked it tons, i think any of us would have done the same. Yeah her true character came through in that racist stuff a while back but either way with young kids, getting cancer etc is obviously very sad.
At first i thought it was poor taste of her to be on the papers after every single scan she has but as she said in an interview she wants to get as much money as possible for her kids before she goes so fair play to that actually
If it spreads, it's terminal, unless you have more than one primary tumour - which is pretty much unheard of. Bit of a bummer though.
D.
I can't find any amusement in this whatsoever, having lost several people close to me due to this disease.
That was horrendous enough for us, but the main diffference is that my dad was 72, Jade Goody is only 27.
It is one of the tragic things of our times that there is not yet a cure for Cancer.
This whole story is just really deeply saddening.
If any "good" can come out of it then perhaps is that it will raise awarness of the importance of screening and catching cancer early etc..
Regarding Jade Goodie, even though I've never actually watched her in anything, going by what I've heard/read about her she's the sort of self-promoting talentless person who so pervades modern TV, plus she's also supposedly a brain dead chav, which makes here even less desirable as a TV personality. That said, though, it's tragic that she's dying of cancer, all the more so if she's a mother. I hope there's a good and caring father for the children.
The newspapers must love it though. The British media change their stance on anyone according to what view will best sell papers.
Actually, I have seen her, she was in Eight Out of Ten Cats, a comedy quiz show, and she got confused between ferrets and pheasants! I'm sure that was her.
Dunny, what is cancer? I've heard that cancer is when healthy new cells are born when the old cells are (that they should replace) are still alive, so the new cells force their way through the old cells, causing damage. Is this true?
Now, I must say I do feel truely sorry for her, its really sad.
Thanks, ewgf.
As for Jade Goody, I never ever watched Big Brother, but I did used to be a bit of a couch potato a few years back.
One show I did for some reason get into watching was called "Back to Reality" on Channel Five - perhaps five or six years ago.
The show was very derivative of previous reality shows and wasn't a success, I think it got axed after one or two series.
It featured a house actually inside the Channel five studios with a mock front garden, street and postbox etc..
The one I watched had Jade Goody, Major James Hewitt, Uri Geller, Maureen from Driving School, Ricardo the Hairdresser and a few other "celebs" in it.
I remember James Hewitt won the whole thing in the end. Behaviour-wise, Jade Goody didn't seem too bad in that one (more emotional than anything) but it's the only thing I've ever seen her in. I've never seen firsthand any of the more notorious stuff like the Shetty incidents.
Of course apart from reality shows, no-one would know who she is, even to this day.
Almost.
When cells divide, they mutate some of the time. It's not currently well understood why this happens, but it's likely due to background or cosmic radiation - and as such is part of the process of evolution. Mutations may be good or bad, and good ones generally tend to increase the chances of being passed by making the organism in question a more attractive mate, or more capable of surviving.
In some cases, the mutations affect what is know as "Programmed Cell Death", or Apoptosis. This is a fail-safe system which allows cells to destroy themselves in certain circumstances. Basically, a cell looks at its neighbours and if it finds that none of them resemble itself, it kills itself. In cancer, this system is damaged and the cell goes ahead and divides to make more, instead of dying off. This is the beginnings of a tumour. All smokers have these cells in their respiratory system.
The human immune system is 99% good enough to detect these cells and kill them off. Every so often, the cancerous cell-bundle is not killed, and grows to a size that the immune system cannot remove. This is a primary tumour.
At this stage, the tumour can be removed or killed by chemotherapy or radiotherapy, and the chances of survival are very good.
After a time, the tumour gets so big that it needs a blood supply of its own. It does this by hooking into yours - and then starts throwing off cancerous cells into your blood stream. Again, this isn't too bad. Your immune system can handle the odd cell. However, one of those cells ends up somewhere else - the liver, lymph nodes, bone marrow (the most painful type of cancer), whatever. That cell grows a new tumour, and is then classed as a "metastatic" tumour. This is fatal in 99% of cases.
When diagnosing a cancer, a biopsy is taken from the tumours that have been found by CT scan and X-rays. A liver cancer cell will look like a mangled liver cell, and if it's found anywhere but the liver, then your primary is in the liver. This test is useful in determining longevity and prognosis - if a tumour is found, and is found to be native to the place they found it, then it's likely the primary, and probably the only one - if no others showed up on scans. You can be treated and stand an very good chance of recovery. If the cell is non-native to the area it is growing, then it's metastatic and there's no point finding the primary (though they often do like to find it). You're basically fucked at this point.
Cancer in the metastatic stage impairs the functions of the organs it has infected. It also devours immense amounts of proteins in its fight to grow in the face of an immense onslaught from the immune system - the cancer is literally fighting for its life. The downside to this is that you are being robbed of your food by the tumour. Hence the sagging skin, pale complexion, bad breath etc - all symptoms of malnutrition.
I work with cancer patients every day. The bad cases are very sad, but it's best to be up front with their chances even when they're very poor. And in a lot of cases I help them to die with dignity in a comfortable environment. Home, if there's enough time to get them there, in a nice quiet room if not. It's a nasty disease, but there is worse out there - cancer will eventually kill you, some other conditions will not, but you'll wish they had.
That, in a nutshell, is cancer in very basic terms.
When we at work first heard that Jade Goody had more than one tumour, we knew she was screwed - and this explanation is why we knew.
D.
We buried his ashes yesterday in the family plot. There was only close family there. I hated it as it brought back all the memories of when he passed away. My mother was in a state. I went to the pub and got drunk! Made me feel better, until today when i woke up with a hangover.
Dunny, thanks for such a concise yet detailed explanation, you explained it very clearly indeed. And look, I think we've argued in the past (probably so, I put people's backs up without meaning to, and I know you can be quick to take offense, though just as quick to accept apology and forget) though I can't remember what about, but I just want to say that my opinion of you as a person (as a programmer it's already sky high) which wasn't low to begin with (you might be short tempered and tactless, but you're no hypocrite, which is far, far worse) has really shot up. To work with people as ill and far gone as you imply, and to see them suffer but to go on every day, takes real courage and compassion. I always wanted to be a doctor, but part of the reason I didn't follow that was because I couldn't stand to see people, especially children, seriously ill and know that I couldn't help them (I am not the most emotionally stable person you'll ever find, and unless you can control yourself in that situation you soon end up no good to anyone).
I know that people want to be home and surrounded by family when they are ill, especially if they know it's terminal, and your obvious sympathy with this speaks volumes for your understanding of them. When there is no hope or chance of recovery, all you can do is to make them as comfortable as possible (there should always be a cure, but this is the real world, sadly), and it's good that their attendants understand this.
Call me a coward, but when I die, I just hope it's quick and painless. Funny, isn't it, how if we knew the when the exact time and date of our deaths were then we'd treasure every second. But since we don't know, we waste time willy nilly, and seem to act like we'll live forever.
Though maybe that's the only way we can get by, in this insane world.
However I am still disgusted at the "I'm out to get as much money as I can" attitude when theres cancer patients being ripped off for car parking fees in hospitals, and having to choose which medication to take cos they cant afford the perscriptions.
Perhaps if she put a bit more effort into that I would have more interest in her case.
Rob...
I also lost my Mum to MRSA which also ,akes me depressed as they claimed said it was a hear attack (though it was induced by the infection it wasn't mentioned)
It sounds a bit like cancer is a self-generated parasite (albeit a rather poor parasite - a good parasite tries not to kill its host).
I'm not a fan of hers at all but if i was in her position i would be doing the same, milking the media for everything i can get before i go. Theres people out there earning millions and spending tons on fancy cars/clothes when people are struggling to buy the drugs they need to battle their cancer.
If I were in her shoes, I'd milk the media for money so I could provide for my children.
If I've read somewhere properly, her ex (father of her sons) is a good father..
My heart goes out to her kids and loved ones - 27 is a shockingly young age.
A bloke i was chatting to the other day, his best mate who does many marathons was training and just died on the spot. Brain haemorage (sp !) or something.
Without sounding morbid i think many of us have to appreciate what we've got and are very lucky compared to many people out there.
Jade might have a fancy car, big house, fair bit of money in the bank but none of that matters now. She would give it all up in a split second if she could be with her kids for the next 20 years etc.
Its bad sometimes we need a new story like this to give us a jolt
I've never heard of MRSA inducing a heart attack - who told you that? MRSA is nothing like the killer that the press make it out to be; we deal with it routinely. First we had pseudomonas. Then the infection du jour was MRSA. The press is bored of that now, so we have scares about Clostridium Difficile. Wonder which "superbug" they're going to pick up on next?
[rant]
Everyone carries MRSA - it lives in the dust in their homes. If patients' relatives didn't bring the bugger into hospital, nobody would catch it. It's not a hospital acquired infection at all - but if a relative comes in to visit with it on their clothes, patients around them will likely catch it.
[/rant]
D.
And the media also chooses to ignore it's in prisons and not hospitals that MRSA has reared its ugly head more often. Hospital numbers are pale in comparison and nothing outside expected numbers for hospital infections.
That might well be true, but the phrase "hospital infections" should be almost unheard of. Hospitals should be as clean as possible, which won't happen as long as cleaning is outsourced to the cheapest bidder. My mate's mum used to clean our hospital in the 70s, and she went in the same hospital a couple of years ago for her back, and she couldn't believe how filthy it was.
Clean as possible == no visitors allowed, at all.
Be careful what you wish for.
In any case, "hospital infections" should be almost unheard of is an exhorbitantly expensive proposition; you'd need all the patients in individual isolation, and a full scrub down for all staff as they move from patient to patient. Hospitals by their nature are concentrations of diseased people.
This sounds like a rant but it isn't,
while not directly causing the heart attack she was weakened to the state where anything was likely to finish her off. She went from quite active to chairbound and on an O2 tank over a few months.
She went into hospital relatively fit and well with a fractured collar bone which required surgery. On returning from London 4 weeks later (I was working there at the time) I was going to visit her (with my kids) and phoned to checked the visiting hours. I was told, she was doing as well as expected.
When quizzed the said that the previous day they had decided the previous day that she had literally 2 hours to live due to an MRSA infection (directly due to)
She survived that and was eventually released (still with the open leg wound), only to be admitted to another hospital the following day. She was placed in a general ward (against her GPs advice). It took them 2 weeks to place her in a separate room to prevent any cross infection.
She survived that too and died about 6 months later. However although the terms heart attack & heart failure where used as cause of death, her GP did stae that the MRSA infection had weakened her to the extent that it was inevitable (but they didn't wish to state the casue of death as the infection). BTW the leg wound had still never healed.
I am well aware that MRSA is all around and not the bogey man the press portray. The hospital in question later closed several wards for deep cleaning due to the large number of post surgery mrsa infections.
My wife (a trained nurse) was forever having to tell the staff that washing their hands would be a good idea (both before and after attending to my mothers care) in both hospitals.
It's role in deaths (particularly in the elderly) is often played down or ignored, and the heartattack / failure reason is given instead (it's easier and expected)
As for the C Diff I have been sickened (pardon the pun) by the coverage of that (we have had extra coverage in Northern Ireland) given by the press attempting to create a story.
On another track:
It annoys me to see people turning up in hospitals with the flu (allegedly) or the winter vomiting bug seeming with the intent of infecting people who are really ill.
Don't worry, I don't take these things personally ;-)
In the following, please don't assume I think you're talking out of your arse!
Interesting. MRSA doesn't usually do that - an already weakened patient who contracts MRSA will have a very hard time, granted. However, even after surgery to a collar-bone, I'd hardly say that was a "weakened patient". After all, what's happened there? She would have had a wound where the surgery took place, and have been through an anaesthetic. Neither would have been an event that could weaken a patient unless they were not fit for surgery in the first place.
Interesting. Where did the leg wound come from? I'm guessing it was an infected ulcer due to poor circulation - if the patient subsequently dies from heart failure, I'd suspect that an underlying (and possibly undiagnosed) case of poor circulation would be at fault here. But hey, I'm not a doctor, don't take my word for it.
The leg wound probably would never heal despite everything that the hospital and GP could do - it was probably ulcerated. I have patients that have made no progress towards healing theirs after three years and more. This is definitely indicative of poor vascular function, and so the heart failure (which means that the heart function is impaired, not stopped) may well be the cause of that. Surgery would not have helped someone with a heart prone to failure, and would have exacerbated things. MRSA at this stage would be disastrous indeed, but cannot be classified as the cause of death. Don't feel bad that it wasn't listed - it can't be, as it cannot be categorically stated that it caused her death.
Just out of interest, did she have any collection of fluid (either chestiness/gurgling cough, or swollen legs and ankles)?
Well, I have to say that's a very poor show. However, due to things like this our hospitals are deep-cleaned every 6 months, and incidence of infection is falling. Your wife is right - all staff should clean their hands, and not many do as often as they should. We're getting better, but we have a way to go yet.
The reason that MRSA is rarely listed as a cause of death is because it hardly ever is the cause of death. There almost always is a co-morbidity alongside that existed before the MRSA attacks the patient, and when the body's resources are being used up trying to fight the disease, the underlying illness usually gets them instead. In a sense, both the hospital and the GP are correct here. You seem to get the idea that someone lied to you somewhere, when it's unlikely that they did - but it's not impossible for all that.
Let me offer my condolences to you on your loss, and that I at least will try harder to reduce infections I may be carrying to my work as a result of your story. Surprisingly enough, we do our job because we care!
Don't get me started on that one. Twice this year we've been closed to admissions because of D&V, and both times because a relative insisted on visiting whilst they had the symptoms. A deep-clean is not a pleasant experience for the staff, I can assure you, and I've had to do it twice now in the last two months :-(
D.
No problem thats the problem with forums, I have taken the liberty to chop down the quotes for everybody elses benefit (I have actually read them though)
As long as information comes from an informed source I'm always ready to listen
Spoke to my brother last night (as he was the person the hospital called to come in and wait with her) and he said the consultant stated septicaemia was goinf to kill her within hours and that it was the antibiotic resistant. When I spoke to the hospital they just stated it was an MRSA infection (that was the staff nurse and doctor I spoke to)
Personally at the time I hust thought that a MRSA infection made an already weak person weaker.
It started as a scratch and got worse, and quite different from the ulcer type issues she later suffered (from being stuck in bed for months). When the scratch turned into a wound her whole leg became red and swollen (in the manner of skin around an infected cut)
That leg wound did heal better than the ulcer type ones which arrived later but the skin around it was always taught & very red, this redness and swelling then continued into the rest of that side of her body. Almost reminded me of the meningitis rash I have had to check the kids for.
Yeah I know her heart stopped and therefore she died, but I do feel that ignoring the reason her heart stopped is part of the dishonesty that can make us (too) cynical about the medical profession.
Nope, the last few weeks whe was given a ventolin inhaler and an O2 tank for shortness of breath, but no gurgling which I'm well aware with regarding chest infections (which I suffer from 3 or 4 times a year).
Unfortunitely I had only seen her once in the 7 weeks before she died as I was stuck in London, and that was escorting her to hospital on Boxing day. They wouldn't allow visitors during the rest of the week as she was in isolation. After that I was stuck couldn't get back home for 6 weeks (yeah do I feel guilty or what)
One thing that interested me in this was that the 'foreign nurses' where much more active in making sure that the hygene rules where followed (the newspapers where complaining about imported labour at the time). Damn I hate the news media (not helped by working in that business for 16 years)
Thanks I'm (still) a little raw about it I suppose, most of all I don't want anybody else to suffer like that
Grrrrr, same as the work place, one guy from another office is now off with pneumonia, unfortunitely he had been in the office coughing everywhere. This upset me as I catch chest infections at the drop of a hat, and having had a hole eaten in 1 lung and a few hospital admissions, I couldn't believe his selfishness.
Anyway back on with the original topic of conversation I suppose.
I still feel that Jade could do so much for other cancer patients by doing something for those who are in even more unfortunate situations than her.
But then who am I to say anything.
rob...