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My name is Len Laviolette. I live in San Diego.
I was diagnosed with colon cancer in spring of 2005.
I didn't feel sick, but I just winded too easily
and my buddy said, better get it checked.
So I did. I got in the very next day and
I went in, they did my blood work.
And that same day as my blood work,
I got a call from Kaiser at 9:30, 10:00 at night.
I was already asleep.
Said no, you've got to get in here right now.
We got some problems.
And they did a colonoscopy on me within hours.
This was very early the next morning.
Sure enough, I had colon cancer.
So there were no options for me
except for the surgery and the chemo.
When they told me, they said your
doctor will be in, in a few minutes.
And he was. It was Dr. Ecksomay.
I didn't know him at the time, but he came into the room
and he knew I was scared.
It wasn't two or three minutes when he sat and talked to me,
right then I knew I was going to be okay.
I truly knew in my heart that this is going to be okay.
I had my surgery and it was a successful surgery.
I was told I had to have chemo.
I had what they called a right hemicolectomy
And when they removed the mass, they took 23 lymph nodes
with them and all 23 of them were cancerous.
I qualified for a research program.
A chemo research program.
So there was part of my chemo cocktail.
And so the chemo wasn't fun, but it was not as
bad as I thought it was going to be.
The chemo nurses at the Zion facility are wonderful.
Nancy and John.
It's seven years now and I just had my last oncology visit a
month or two again and I'm still clean.
Matter of fact, it's like it never happened.
Every time I have to go down there for anything at all,
it's just so easy.
One visit, if they have any other questions or they need a
lab work or an EKG or an x-ray or something,
doctor plugs it into the computer and I
go down to the elevator and get it done.
And by the time I get back up to the doctor
the results are there.
Then by the time I get home from the visit,
everything I've done is there.
I check my email and there's a link to what they just did.
And everything they did, it's right there.
After the experience with the cancer,
I retired early.
I've been building classical guitars
as a hobby for about 27 years.
It's something I wanted to do.
It's my life's goal because I love building guitars.
They're in recordings and on-stage now in quite a few
different places, and it really feels fun.
It's really rewarding to do.
Anyhow, I'm a real fan of Kaiser.
I make no bones about telling anybody that.
I think it's for their own sake. I can't think of a better place
to be covered for health than Kaiser.