Philip Prichard was heading home from a business trip. He told his wife he wasn’t feeling very well. She took him to the doctor and a CT scan revealed a tumor weighing almost four pounds in his abdomen. The tumor was removed but soon after a second was discovered near Philip’s adrenal gland.
In the spring of 2013, Philip came to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Says Philip, “We came to MD Anderson because we heard it was one of the best cancer centers in the country. I knew MD Anderson would have the best treatment for the cancer I had.”
Doctors immediately started Philip on a powerful new immunotherapy drug. “It was the uniqueness of it all. Immunotherapy takes my immune system and targets the cancer cells directly. I didn’t realize there was anything out there like this until I came to MD Anderson.”
“The first treatment lasted about an hour, and we continued that every other Tuesday for the next three months. After that time, the tumor had reduced by a good thirty percent. It’s like every time we went back to MD Anderson there was good news. I started feeling the hope, realizing I was going to be able to return to work, return to my life, and have a future with my wife.”
Philip sums up his experience quite eloquently. “Remain hopeful,” he says. “The human body is stronger than anyone thinks. I’m living proof.”
