Feature
Cancer Doesn’t DefineYou As a breast and liver cancer fighter, 73-year-old Vicki McDowell is the epitome of positivity. “I am surviving. You see, there’s this one thing – cancer doesn’t define who you truly are.” It all started in 2004. Vicki had a mammogram where her doctor discovered a lump and diagnosed her with breast cancer. She had it removed and began radiation treatment, but in 2006, her doctor found another lump in her breast. This time, she had a mastectomy and for six years, Vicki was cancer-free. That was until 2012, when she noticed pains along her mastectomy incision. She got a CAT scan which showed multiple spots in her liver, and was referred to see Dr. Mark Fesen at Central Care Cancer Center in Great Bend, who diagnosed her with Stage 4 liver cancer. For the first few months, Dr. Fesen had Vicki on the chemotherapy medication Taxol while he investigated the source of her liver cancer. “Dr. Fesen, being the way that he is, wasn’t satisfied with the answers,” Vicki explains, “He kept sending out biopsies and blood work, everything to various colleagues. Finally, a lab in California found it. I was HER2-Positive.” HER2 is a protein that promotes growth on the outside of all breast cells. Breast cancer cells with higher than normal levels of HER2 are called HER2postive. These cancers tend to grow and spread faster than other breast cancers, but are more likely to respond to treatment with drugs that target the HER2 protein. At the time she found out about
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her liver cancer, Vicki’s husband of 51 years, Jim, was living in Oklahoma City waiting for a heart transplant. The couple was only able to see each other on weekends for lunch in Wichita, and with the impending heart surgery, Vicki was nervous to tell Jim about her liver. “At first I didn’t tell him because I knew,” Vicki says, “I knew that he would quit and he was already pretty high up on the list for a new heart.” Jim did successfully receive his heart transplant in December of 2012. Vicki continued with the Taxol regimen, but Dr. Fesen noticed that her progress was starting to plateau and wanted to try something else. He
explored the options and suggested she participate in a clinical study involving the chemotherapy drug Capecitabine, to which Vicki agreed. “I have huge respect for Dr. Fesen,” Jim explains, “Because with my heart issues that I’ve been through, I’ve met a lot of doctors. What I really admired about him, and still do, is his determination to find an answer like he did for Vicki.” While she was on Capecitabine, she had a few side effects, but handled it pretty well for four years. However, Vicki’s tumor markers started rising again, so Dr. Fesen suggested another clinical study that involved the chemotherapy drug Kadcyla. This clinical trial required a trip to Overland Park every three weeks, which Vicki and Jim did not feel up to, so they opted out.
