Julie Whyte Pancreatic Cancer Survivor

Doctors again told Julie the problem lay in her gallbladder, sending her to a larger facility in Dubuque, Iowa, the next day to have her gallbladder removed. When the gastrointestinal surgeon reviewed Julie’s scans, he spotted a “shadowy area,” noting that he and one of the hospital’s radiologists wanted to take a closer look at the spot in question.

The hospital in Dubuque took out Julie’s gallbladder and put her in touch with physicians at the UW Health | Carbone Cancer Center in Madison, Wisconsin. There, Julie’s doctor scheduled her for an endoscopic ultrasound, but told her she had a less than 1% chance of the shadowy area turning out to be cancer.

Unfortunately, the endoscopic ultrasound revealed that Julie did, in fact, have pancreatic cancer (“I’m an overachiever!” she joked), so things moved quickly after that, with Julie having a video conference call (due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic) with an oncologist, surgical oncologist and nutritionist.

While, often, doctors have a patient with pancreatic cancer undergo chemotherapy before having surgery, Julie’s care team thought her cancer cells might be resistant to chemo, so they arranged for her to have a Whipple procedure, an intensive operation used to treat some people with pancreatic cancer, as soon as possible.

Julie had an eight-hour Whipple procedure March 5, 2021, and remained in the hospital for another eight days. About six weeks later, she began having adjuvant chemotherapy, or chemo after surgery, to reduce the risk of the cancer returning. She began taking FOLFIRINOX in mid-April and continued through late October, finding that the chemo treatments proved especially brutal.

Despite these challenges, both Julie and Todd had something to smile about – their first grandbaby, William Alan, arrived February 9, bringing new light and purpose into their lives. Moments like these have become even more meaningful in recent years, with Julie noting that her strong support system, including her husband, children, siblings, extended family and friends, played a huge part in helping her navigate ongoing challenges.

Her support network even surprised Julie with several parties, with one taking place before she began chemo and another acknowledging both the end of her chemo treatments and Julie reaching another birthday. At one of those celebrations, Julie’s niece handed out custom T-shirts that read, “In this family, no one fights alone,” a simple phrase that captured the love and strength that have surrounded Julie since the beginning. She also found joy in spending time with her dogs, a Yellow Labrador and a Cavalier King Charles/Cocker Spaniel mix who rarely left her side during treatment. That second dog, her constant companion during the hardest days, passed away just 10 days after Julie completed chemo – as if she’d waited until Julie was safely through the fight before letting go.

These days, Julie still experiences neuropathy in her toes and fingertips, which she treats using alpha-lipoic acid on the advice of one of her nurses. She also eats relatively normally, although she takes CREON to help with digestion.

Julie is also taking steps to build strength in the aftermath of her ordeal, investing in an E-bike for exercise and a vibration plate (sometimes called a “power plate”) to help release toxins and stimulate muscle contractions.

She’s also had time to reflect on the treatment she received from multiple facilities throughout her experience with pancreatic cancer, gaining perspective on what worked well and where there might be room for improvement. While, overall, she had positive experiences with medical professionals, she does wish those treating people with pancreatic cancer would take more time with patients and give deeper, more thorough answers and explanations to patient questions.

For example, Julie found that it was often up to her to ask about blood pressure, which, in her case, had always been normal before her diagnosis but rose sharply in the days and months that followed. She wishes health care professionals would take a more proactive approach to asking about and addressing such questions, rather than relying on patients, many of whom lack medical training, to raise such concerns.

She also hopes that, in the future, medical specialists will communicate more with one another, with, for example, cardiologists and oncologists speaking more frequently to provide more coordinated and comprehensive care. Julie believes increased communications would help ease the burden on patients, and that it may also lead to better outcomes and improved quality of life.