BOISE, Idaho (CBS2) — "I had no idea what pancreatic cancer was until my mom was diagnosed and heard that Patrick Swayze had died from it. That was pretty much the extent of it," said Katy Palmer of Pancreatic Cancer Action Network of Boise.
Palmer volunteers with PANCAN. Her mother was diagnosed with the disease back in 2016.
"We found out it was stage 3 or locally advanced which meant the tumor had grown into the surrounding arteries but it hadn’t yet metastasized all over her entire body," Palmer said.
In a panic, as you can imagine, Katy immediately started researching pancreatic cancer.
"I started looking at some of the statistics which are extremely grim. Pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest cancers. It has a survival rate of ten percent over five years and the particular stage my mom was is even more grim than that," Palmer said.
Sadly, Katy's mom did not beat the disease. But Katy has turned her family's loss into a mission to educate us all about the heinous nature of pancreatic cancer.
"I think why this particular cancer is so particularly insidious is because it’s often not caught early enough some of those vague symptoms like abdominal discomfort or back discomfort that most people experience," Palmer said.
When it comes to pancreatic cancer, education is key to getting ahead of the disease.
"It really is that early detection... that's really really key to stopping this disease in its tracks," Palmer said.
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