Stories

Ron with his wife. I was diagnosed on August 31, 2010. I had biopsy surgery on September 17, 2010 and a cancerous tumor was discovered and removed. On October 29, 2010 (five days after my 61st birthday), I had a radical cystectomy and neobladder surgery. I was able to… Read More

Father and daughter are unlikely BCG buddies While older men are the most likely to be diagnosed with bladder cancer, imagine our surprise when BCAN met Mike Bartlett and his daughter Kristin Hoisington at the 2018 Houston Walk to End Bladder Cancer. Fifty-seven-year-old Mike was diagnosed with bladder cancer in 2016, after his primary care physician sent him to… Read More

“Anne is an incredible example of a patient who refused to be paralyzed by her diagnosis of cancer. She had an incredibly positive attitude from the beginning. She is a very active and motivated person. That didn’t change just because she was diagnosed with cancer,” noted Dr. Noah Hahn, Deputy… Read More

A New Hampshire native, Anne Theriault now lives in Maryland. Anne spent many years in non-traditional careers with the US Army and in the Bureau of Prisons. She deployed four times to combat zones. Anne began taking up ballroom dancing after a challenging combat tour in Iraq. “I just did… Read More

Like many bladder cancer patients, I was shocked when a urologist gave me the diagnosis. Cancer wasn’t for me; it was for other people. And bladder cancer? I didn’t know anything about it, but some quick research confirmed I had no obvious risk factors. All moot, though. My wife Eva… Read More

Bladder cancer can be a sneaky disease. Sometimes you have very few symptoms until things hit a critical mass.  For me, that happened in the form of a suspected urinary tract infection (UTI). I’ve had UTI’s my whole adult life, so the latest one in summer of 2012 didn’t seem… Read More

2016 was the scariest year of my life. I urinated blood around Christmas in 2015, and a CAT scan in February 2016 found a tumor.  I had a cystectomy on April 1 and the results were determined to be an aggressive cancer. Next, was another cystectomy which saved me from… Read More

In December 2001, my life changed when I was diagnosed with bladder cancer.  In the summer of 2001, I noticed urinary changes that I attributed to turning 48 years old.  Continency and frequency became issues and my urine turned cloudy with a tinge of darkish red from time to time. … Read More

BCAN asked Dr. Andrea Apolo, Chief of the Bladder Cancer Section of the Genitourinary Malignancies Branch of the National Cancer Institute, what researchers learn from bladder cancer patients who do not survive in a clinical trial. This is what she shared with us: Mr. Read More