I had a video consultation with
UCLA Dr. Raman that does the Tulsa procedure. If it's decided that I should get treated, I am a good candidate for the Tulsa procedure. Dr. Raman describes protate cancer as "minnows" and "sharks" where minnows are not an immediate threat but sharks are. To help determine the aggressiveness of my particular cancer, he is ordering a "decipher" test. This is done using the cells already removed during my biopsy. The Dr. also wants me to consult with 2 other UCLA Dr's. a urologist and a radiologist. My next consultation will be May 5th. with a radiologist. The following consultation isn't until the end of June. Dr. Raman feels that I can wait until after the 1st. of the year which is good and bad. It's good because I think the Tulsa procedure will be covered by Medical next year. The downside is that I've switched to original medicare at a cost of $450 a month and was planning on switching back to an advantage plan during open enrollment this year. Now I'll need to stay on original medicare until open enrollment after I have the procedure done. That means Jan 2026. So, that's a little less than $10k but still a lot better than $35k. Another thing the Dr. mentioned was that they were are finding from study results, some early patients receiving Tulsa had to have follow up procedures because the initial treatment wasn't aggressive enough. So, they started getting more aggressive but are now seeing an uptick in side effects. Both the need for additional treatments and side effects are still much lower than other procedures. One last point that the Dr. made is that not treating "minnows" has the same eventual outcome as treating patients that have "minnow" level cancer. He stressed that there is no perfect way to determine whether the cancer will metastasize or not, but there are good odds given all of the various tests available today. For all of you Tulsa patients, please keep posting.