"Stop, stop, stop!" screamed the patient, gripping the bedrails with all her might as the resident threaded gauze into her vagina. She had late stage cervical cancer, and the attending physician had ordered the gauze packing to prevent additional bleeding after radiation treatment.
After watching this patient scream her head off as the resident packed her vagina with gauze post-radiation treatment to her uterus, or watching a dermatologist painstakingly freeze off what looked like a rooster's crown worth of warts off one poor man's genital region, I am profoundly grateful that I likely will never experience these things. Why? Because I am vaccinated against HPV. I am vaccinated against cervical cancer and genital warts - or at least the most dangerous / common strains of HPV that cause these conditions. It's not a perfect thing, but I'll take it. If you could get a vaccine that prevents cancer, wouldn't you want it? Wouldn't you want your children to have it?
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