“Women don’t go to their own physicians early enough. It is necessary that they be trained to understand symptoms which do not at first seem serious enough for medical attention. Besides, I regret to confess, in this matter of cancer our physicians need educating, too. They are too prone to say, if they are not sure of the diagnosis, ‘Wait and see.’ Waiting to see is what kills three fourths of the women who succumb to cancer. Let me illustrate this peril by two cases which have come under my observation: The wife of a lawyer in a Western city had a severe attack of stomach trouble. Her doctor, a young and open-minded man, had the courage to say, ‘I don’t know. But I’m afraid it’s cancer. You’d better go to such-and-such a hospital and let them see.’ The woman went. An exploratory incision was made and carcinoma found in the early stage. It was cut out and to-day she is as good as new.
“Now, this same lawyer had a friend who had been treated for months by a stomach specialist of some reputation. Under the treatment he had grown steadily thinner, paler, and weaker. ‘Indigestion, gastric intoxication,’ the specialist repeated, parrotlike, until the man himself, in his misery, began to suspect. At this point the lawyer friend got hold of him and took him to the hospital where his wife had been. The surgeons refused the case and sent the man away to die. Indignant, the lawyer sought the superintendent of the hospital.
“‘Why won’t you take my friend’s case?’
“‘It is inoperable.’
“‘Isn’t it cancer of the stomach, like my wife’s?’
“‘Yes.’
“‘You cured my wife. Why can’t you cure my friend?’
“The official shook his head.
“I want an answer,” insisted the lawyer.
“‘Well, frankly,’ said the other, ‘your wife’s physician knew his business. Your friend’s physician is a fool. He has killed his patient by delay.’