This is all over the internet. BasicBasic idea is to check the system table INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNSINFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS for your column. I'mI'm assuming "none exists" applies to the name of the column only.
http://snippets.dzone.com/posts/show/4663
http://www.genexbs.com/blog/gbs.php/2008/08/09/how-to-check-if-column-exists-in-mysql-t