Patrick Cline

Patrick’s journey with kidney cancer is a little unusual and that is part of the reason we wanted to tell his story. He was first diagnosed when he was only in his 30s. That is quite young for kidney cancer with the median age of diagnosis usually in the mid 60’s. He was treated with a radical nephrectomy and followed for about 5-7 years with no sign of recurrence, so follow up stopped

Patrick lived a fairly normal life without many concerns about kidney cancer. He lived 5-7 years with no sign of recurrence. Sometimes had some right side back pain and just thought it was due to musculoskeletal aches. Unfortunately he caught COVID during the pandemic. They scanned his chest and caught a little bit of a soft tissue mass where the kidney had been before. Upon further investigation, there was a mass almost the size of the kidney in the place the kidney had formerly been

There were no signs of metastasis elsewhere. So here he was 21 years later with what looked like a recurrent kidney mass. He underwent robotic mass removal. He’s recovering nicely and getting back to normal life, spending time with family and friends.

Pat is hoping the cancer never recurs again, but if it does, he plans to get at least 21 more years of living and great experience.