CCR News: Patient Stories

Oct 23, 2019

We’re celebrating breast cancer awareness month by sharing the story of Samantha Seinfeld, a metastatic breast cancer survivor who participated in a CCR first-in-human clinical trial over 10 years ago. Since then, she has remained cancer-free. Margaret Gatti-Mays, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.P., Assistant Research Physician in the Laboratory of Tumor Immunology and Biology, and James Gulley, M.D., Ph.D., Chief of the Genitourinary Malignancies Branch, are currently evaluating Samantha’s unusual immune response in hopes of improving the responses of other patients. Read more...

Sep 12, 2019

Thirteen-year-old Dom was diagnosed with neurofibromatosis type 1 at birth. Because of Dom’s diagnosis, he hasn’t always had the opportunity to do the things the average teenager does, but his first year at Camp Fantastic changed that. Camp Fantastic, an annual week-long camp for pediatric cancer patients and survivors, gave Dom the opportunity to try lots of new things and some familiar ones in a setting of support, safety and friendship. Read more...

Jun 18, 2019

Xavier, a patient in the Pediatric Oncology Branch, was born with an incompletely formed leg bone and a large number of dark spots all over his body. When Xavier broke his weak leg at only 11 months of age, he was diagnosed with neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1). He came to the NIH for treatment, and his tumors have shrunk by more than 20 percent thanks to treatment with selumetinib. Read more...

May 8, 2019

Randy, a father, husband, engineering quality consultant and lifelong “Motor City” resident, was diagnosed with hairy cell leukemia in 1998 at the age of 41. After participation in a clinical trial at the NIH Clinical Center, his body has shown a complete response to the drug moxetumomab pasudotox, which was developed at the National Cancer Institute’s Center for Cancer Research. Read more...

Feb 26, 2019

James and Jahleel are a father-daughter duo from Tennessee who came to NIH for Jahleel’s bone marrow transplant. Jahleel was diagnosed with GATA2 deficiency, a rare genetic disease that causes a wide range of symptoms, including myeloid leukemias.  Read more...

Sep 28, 2018

In August of 2013, eight months into his volunteer deployment in Afghanistan, Michael Mai noticed a small lump between his neck and shoulder. The former world-class hammer thrower initially brushed it off as nothing but was later diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). Mai came to NIH and received treatment from Mark Roschewski, M.D., Clinical Director of the Lymphoid Malignancies Branch, that ultimately cleared him of the disease. Read more...

Aug 1, 2018

A 14-year battle with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer led Tom to the doors of the NIH Clinical Center. A combination immunotherapy clinical trial led by James Gulley, M.D., Ph.D., turned the tide in his fight and led to a passion for advising prostate cancer patients. Read more...

Jun 11, 2018

When standard treatment failed to eliminate her late-stage breast cancer, Judy Perkins turned to a clinical trial led by Steven Rosenberg, M.D., Ph.D., Chief of the Surgery Branch at the Center for Cancer Research. The trial uses a novel immunotherapy approach of multiplying specific cancer-fighting cells and injecting them into a patient’s bloodstream to kill the cancer. In a recent interview with CBS News’ Jonathan LaPook, Perkins — who remains cancer free more than two years later — shares her clinical trial experience.  Read more...

Jun 1, 2018

In January 2016, Sarah Rosenfeld had such severe pain shooting down her legs she couldn’t walk, sleep or care for her young daughters. After weeks of physical therapy for what she thought was sciatica, she had an MRI. Thirty-seven-year-old Rosenfeld learned she had something far worse: myxopapillary ependymoma, a rare cancerous tumor in her spinal cord. She came to the NIH for treatment options and enrolled in a clinical trial with Mark Gilbert, M.D., Chief of the Neuro-Oncology Branch at the Center for Cancer Research. Read more...

Apr 23, 2018

Drs. Tracie Miller and Steve Lipshultz have spent their careers caring for pediatric patients and conducting research at well-known medical institutions across the country. In some ways, those years of providing patient care and conducting medical research prepared the couple for Tracie’s ovarian cancer diagnosis, and in other ways, it didn’t. Read more...