Alanlee,
Welcome to the club. Hopefully, someone can snip this post from here to start a brand new thread for your story.
Your situation sounds similar to beginning of mine. Also had enlarged prostate and various prostate issues. Also had blood in the urine. Didn't go the emergency room but my regular doctor referred me to a urologist.
Went to him and he did a cysto in the office, found a red spot about the size of the pinky finger from the top knuckle up. I was going on a two week business trip so we scheduled the biopsy (in hospital cystoscope and TURBT) for when I returned.
Sure enough, it wound up being CIS (Carcinoma in Situ) which basically just means a flat cancerous tumor.
Sorry to say, but most of the time when they see a "red spot", it winds up being cancer. Not always--mind you, but often.
CIS is very aggressive and always categorized as high grade. That doesn't mean doomsday however. It means one should not take a laid back attitude to treatment though. BCG is the standard treatment for CIS and has a very good track record.
Lots of people here have had BCG treatments and have been cancer free for years and years. I didn't do well with BCG and mine came back a couple of years later. Still, that was over two years ago now. Needed to get a bladder replacement (and they also got rid of that pesky prostate) but I am doing just fine and there is nothing I can't do that I could do before.
I might be rushing things a bit and you may not even have CIS. The pathology report will tell you that and all of us here can empathize with your frustration over having to wait.
Here is a link to flow chart I put together a while back.
Bladder Cancer Treatment
Some folks have found this helpful for understanding what the standard methods of treatment are depending on stage/grade.
A few folks printed it out and brought it with them to use as a guide for discussion about their treatment with their urologist.
You will see on the chart that if you do get diagnosed with bladder cancer, the next step is to get to a top bladder cancer specialist. Typically, they will read the slides and reports from your urologist and then schedule a follow up TURBT. You won't believe how often some is missed the first time and also how often the original surgeon doesn't get deep enough to fully stage the cancer. The follow up TURBT helps reduce this probability.
As you have already discovered, when caught early bladder cancer is very treatable. I'm really, really hoping that the pathology report comes back and disqualifies you from membership in our group here. However, if you do have bladder cancer confirmed, we are here to help. Ask us anything about anything related to bladder cancer, urologists, top docs/hospitals for getting to the right specialist, etc.
Let us know as soon as you get the pathology report. Get a copy of it for yourself also. All you have to do is request it and sign a release (basically giving yourself permission to see you own medical record).
All the best!
Mike
PS: When you go to the doctor to find out the test results, if he says the word cancer (hope he doesn't), you are only going to hear every 8th word after that. Blood will rush to your brain and you're going to feel confused to say the least. Have someone come with you if you can. Bring a notebook with questions or to just write down things he says so you can read it later and better remember. Once I requested all of my urologists notes and reports (a couple months into my treatment), I was amazed at the things he said in the notes that he discussed with me that I had no memory of whatsoever.
