Friday, Nov. 7 probably was the best day I’ve had in two years of bad news.

I rode shotgun as Dolores drove me home from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, seemingly free of prostate cancer following an innovative procedure not readily available in our Byzantine health care system.

A radiologist, Dr. Daniel Adamo, on Nov. 4 froze out my tumors in an out-patient procedure that lasted a couple hours. The operation, called cryoablation, was done while I was in a live magnetic resonance imaging session, so needles shooting frigid gas could be precisely targeted at the tumors. Multiple freeze-thaw sessions were conducted.

Dr. Adamo declared when I woke up that he got all the cancerous tissue.

He sprung me from the joint. I had to wear a catheter for a couple days and hang around the hotel just in case. But I was clear of a cloud hanging over me.

I was diagnosed with prostate cancer in Spencer after my PSA test scores jumped over a matter of months. The urologist said I could have it removed or radiated at Spencer in 28 daily sessions. There can be nasty side effects like incontinence and other disappointing guy stuff.

A friend in California said we were behind the times. He had focal therapy performed, where the tumor could be killed but the prostate is not.

I was scanned from Storm Lake to Spencer to Sioux City to Iowa City and back to Storm Lake. Every lab tech on the circuit got a peek up my bum and around my groin. In the process they found an aneurysm in my abdominal aorta that demanded urgent attention at the University of Iowa Hospital. Dr. Nanette Reed prescribed stents, and I thought I was gonna die before they knocked me out. I woke up. She fixed me. I gave up Marlboros.

That whole episode put my cancer treatment on hold. A urological oncologist at the University of California-Irvine determined through genetic analysis that the prostate cancer was not aggressive and was unlikely to spread. He advised patience and calm.

Calm I was not. I felt miserable. A hormone shot wiped out my testosterone. I was sweating and depressed. I was scared to death. My old college roomie, a clinical psychologist, counseled me over the phone. Dr. Uchio out in Irvine told me to check my fear. A cure would be on the way.

As my aortic stents settled in, I continued to research my options with cryoablation. It appeared that California would be impractical. I found out the Mayo Clinic does it so I called. A nice lady answered the phone and told me they could get after me right away. Now, where did you have scans done?

Spencer, Storm Lake, Sioux City, Tippecanoe and Tyler, too. With genetic analysis thrown in from California.

Whoa, honey! She was breathless.

I told her that rural health care is no picnic. We don’t have all the tools in the shed because the government and the insurance companies don’t think we are worth the investment.

So I drove to the urological embrace of Dr. Derek Lomas in Rochester, a Drake pharmacy grad to boot and thus certifiably smart, who assured me that they could tackle my tumor.

He lined me up with Dr. Adamo, the Iceman radiologist.

And it was gone, just like that.

Because local doctors kept close watch in the first place.

Because Dr. Reed the vascular surgeon in Iowa City sort of took command of the situation and charted how things would play out.

Because I persisted at getting the right procedure at the right place.

You must be your own health care advocate. Thank LBJ for Medicare, because it allowed me to go to Mayo Clinic when a private insurance policy would not. Dr. Adamo does two or three MRI-based prostate procedures a day, among other things. They don’t do it in Sioux City, where a private health insurance policy would direct you.

Everyone deserves Medicare. We can afford it.

Everyone deserves the level of care at the Mayo Clinic or the University of Iowa Hospital. In Newton or Keokuk, a woman cannot even have a baby. That is pathetic. The government is starving rural health care through low reimbursement rates. Insurance companies are denying people the best health care available regionally. Our newspaper’s health insurance does not let you go to Mayo or even the University of Iowa. That is cruel and inhumane.

Science matters. The Trump Administration is tearing down the greatest research engine in the world. Research led to my minimally-invasive aorta surgery at Iowa City, where I only spent one night in the hospital and saved Medicare a ton of money. Research led to my outpatient cancer treatment at Mayo, which is a lot cheaper and easier than daily radiation treatments for a month. This pyramid is being blown up by fools who think you can cure yourself by wearing garlic around your neck.

The doctors will watch my blood tests in three and six months, but I should be in the clear. What a relief from a long, tortuous path that started when a doc with huge hands gloved up and said, “Bend over that table and relax.” Good that one is in the rearview mirror!

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Art Cullen won the Pulitizer Prize for his journalism

at the Storm Lake Pilot