MEDICAL VERDICT: ONE VERY HEALTHY SEPTUAGENARIAN

By Christine Gorman

Few people ever see Bob Dole like this, compassionately speaking to several dozen survivors of prostate cancer. For this politician on the run, whose malignancy was diagnosed in 1991, the visit is no drop-by. Dole stays more than two hours, his hard edges softening a bit. "The one thing you learn, I think, more than anything else," he says, "is it's good to get together from time to time with people who've had the same experience and try to see what we can do to help each other."

Dole's famously cranky wit cannot resist a jab or two. "I didn't think it would happen to me. I thought it happened only to Democrats," he quips. Less predictably, his wry remarks on this April day in 1993, 16 months after surgeons removed his prostate, eventually segue into a discussion of the side effects that keep people from seeking treatment. Despite improvements in surgical technique, the majority of patients suffer at least temporary impotence, and a few also become incontinent. "Unless we talk to each other fairly frankly, we don't learn much in these sessions," he tells the group. "Some of the things that we read about don't return quite as quickly as advertised."

Such topics make most men squeamish, but Dole's candor is likely to help him. His decision to release a detailed nine-page set of his medical records last week could go a long way toward reassuring voters that at 72, he is still in robust health. The average man who lives to be that age can, according to actuarial tables, expect to live an additional 11 years and four months. Dole's health report shows him to be solidly above average for this stage of life. "It's remarkably unremarkable," says Dr. Mark Williams, 45, a geriatrician at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine who reviewed the information for Time. "I'd be happy to trade lab results with him right now."

Most men between the ages of 65 and 74 have a cholesterol level of 218 mg/dL. Dole, thanks to a low-fat diet and medication, has a commendable 182 mg/dl. Nearly 60% of men in the same age group suffer from hypertension. Dole's blood pressure, however, holds steady at a sound 104/70.

Apart from his prostate cancer, Dole's most significant medical concerns stem from his World War II injuries. Shrapnel still lies buried in his right shoulder. His partially paralyzed right arm has atrophied from disuse, although he can maneuver it to grab and pull back on a rowing machine. Aggressive physical therapy after the war allowed him to rescue most of the use of his left arm. But during his three-year convalescence, he developed an infection that required his right kidney to be removed. Sonograms have shown that his left kidney has, as expected, got larger in order to compensate for its increased load. (Doctors note that thousands of people live quite normally on a single kidney.) A small stone was removed from his remaining kidney in 1981, but there have been no further complications since then.

X rays taken in May reveal that Dole's heart shows no signs of coronary disease. Like many Americans who were raised on a fatty diet, however, Dole suffers from diverticulosis, a condition in which small pouches of tissue form within the intestinal lining and may occasionally bleed and cause discomfort. A daily regimen of Metamucil and foods high in fiber has successfully kept him from experiencing any painful episodes as a result of this ailment.

Claiming to be cured of cancer is still risky -- whether from a medical or a political point of view. When Paul Tsongas of Massachusetts stated during the 1992 presidential campaign that his lymphoma was in remission and he had been cancer free for five years, he neglected to mention at that time a single recurrence just a year after receiving a bone-marrow transplant to treat the disease. Even though the selective disclosure became a media issue after Tsongas had already quit the race, he continues to be, to this day, quite healthy.

No such surprises are likely to be in store for Dole. The tumor that was removed four years ago, along with the majority leader's prostate, was small and had not spread. Every six months since then Dole has undergone a highly sensitive test for a protein called prostate-specific antigen, or PSA. This substance can act like an early-warning device, alerting physicians to the presence or recurrence of the cancer.

Luckily for Dole, his age actually works in his favor. Because prostate cancer usually grows so slowly in older men, even if a tiny malignant cell had escaped from Dole's prostate before the organ was removed and had seeded another tumor elsewhere in his body, chances are excellent that he would still die with prostate cancer, as opposed to from it. "You can't guarantee a 100% cure," says Dr. Gerald Chodak, director of the Prostate/Urology Center at University of Chicago Hospital. "But the odds are very much in his favor." In Chodak's opinion, Dole could run for President "three times [in a row] and not get into trouble" from his prostate. Whether or not he will get that chance is still, of course, up to the electorate.

--Reported by Hannah Bloch/Washington and J. Madeleine Nash/Chicago

With reporting by HANNAH BLOCH/WASHINGTON AND J. MADELEINE NASH/CHICAGO