E403 — Cancer Expert, Cancer Patient: A Doctor Faces the Disease He Knows Best

Who better to get lung cancer than one of the world’s leading experts on lung cancer? Admittedly, the word “better” is not really right here. But this is essentially what we heard from Dr. Ross Camidge when he sat down to talk with Cody for this week’s episode. Ross is a global expert in his field, the doctor other doctors go to. In 2022, he was diagnosed with a form of advanced non-small cell lung cancer driven by a specific acquired genetic change in the tumor cells — one of the exact types of lung cancer he has spent his career researching and treating. For more than two years, Ross kept his diagnosis close, only telling a small circle of peers and his family for fear of negatively impacting his patients and the work he still had left to do. But disease progression eventually made it impossible to hide it any longer, and he came out of his diagnosis closet. When people found out he had the very type of cancer he’s an expert on, they’d often react with dismay at the irony. “You’re the last person who should get this,” they’d say. But Ross sees things differently. Who better to understand and navigate cancer’s maze of diagnoses and decisions? Who better to learn through his own experience what it has been like for the community of cancer patients he’s treated for years? And who better to take this two-sided coin of knowledge to the world and share what he’s seen? As he says, he sees it as a privilege that he gets to “take one diagnosis for the team.” Join Cody and Ross for a brilliant, touching, highly informative and poignantly funny conversation about facing a cancer diagnosis with every card on the table.  For more information on the sponsor of this episode, please visit the Iliff Death Care Collective. For free access to additional content and updates from Cody, visit our Patreon!  And to listen to music from this episode and all episodes, follow our ever-growing playlist on Spotify.