Hope For Her Future

"I guess I don't know what I was expecting. I expected to get a scan and leave. Cancer was never on my mind."
"The first thing that went through my mind was my son. I have a two-month-old baby. I need to see him grow up. This can't be happening to me."
"I have a lot of motivation. I want to see him grow up. I believe in the power of staying positive and having a positive attitude."
Kayla Bradford, 26, Kanata, Ontario

Kayla and her son Leighton. Wayne Cuddington / Postmedia

"We struggle with advocacy and raising awareness for lung cancer, because it is widely perceived that they deserve it [people diagnosed with lung cancer]. There is a stigma."
"We would argue that it doesn't really matter if you smoked or worked hard to quit smoking or are someone like Kayla who never smoked. If you pass away you will be equally mourned by your family and you are equally deserving of the best treatments."
Dr. Paul Wheatley-Price, oncologist, president, Lung Cancer Canada

Lung cancer's cure rate is nothing to pin your hopes on if you've been diagnosed with that dread disease. Five years following diagnosis, 17 percent of lung cancer patients survive in comparison to 87 percent for those diagnosed with breast cancer, and 95 percent of prostate cancer patients. Certainly, mortality rates would be lower for lung cancer patients if they were diagnosed at an earlier stage of their cancer. The reality is that most patients are diagnosed at the point where their cancer has advanced and many are at Stage 4 by that time; an incurable stage.

This is what happened to Kayla Bradford with her diagnosis. By the time she went to an Ottawa hospital's emergency department, had a brain scan and chest X-ray to try to solve the genesis of that persistent cough, unexplained weight loss and exhaustion two months after she had given birth, the cancer had spread to her brain, her liver and her bones. In an effort to find a solution to this problem of late discovery, a cancer screening pilot project for lung cancer has been initiated in the city she lives in.

Currently limited in access to those considered at high risk, which includes a smoking history, the intention is to evaluate the program and eventually give it wider usage. "The real hope over time is that this [screening] could save thousands of lives", explained Dr. Wheatley-Price. The screening process itself is yet in the development stages, in the hopes that a method will be found dependably safe and sufficiently accurate to enable wider usage, with confidence.

Before Kayla Bradford was given the diagnosis of her condition, a doctor advised that she call someone to the hospital to be with her. That was her first intimation that the diagnosis would be serious. Even then she never dreamed what it might be and the impact it would have on her life. She was advised that the scans had identified spots on her lung and brain which on close scrutiny were identified as advanced lung cancer.

For a young woman who had never smoked, the diagnosis came as an understandable shock.That was ten months ago. Her son is a year old now.

Annually, 20,000 Canadians die as a result of lung cancer, representing more deaths than those caused by breast, colorectal and prostate cancer in combination. However, despite the fact that lung cancer is responsible for over 25 percent of cancer deaths, researchers receive a mere 6 percent of research dollars meant to target specific cancers. A recent survey pointed out that 20 percent of people have less sympathy for lung cancer patients than for those afflicted with other types of cancers.

This, despite that 15 percent of lung cancer patients have never smoked. On the bright side, new treatment options have surfaced, never before available. Kayla Bradford's subtype, ALK-positive lung cancer is a rare form yet several therapies that directly target her cancer are available. Post- diagnosis she had radiation therapy, and then she was prescribed targeted oral therapy, chemotherapy done with. Her reaction to the initial drug made her nauseated and unable to eat. The second type of drug is more readily tolerated by her system and it has been helpful.

The last scan she had undergone showed her tumours to have been diminished in size since using the targeted therapy. Those drugs are costly; $14,000 monthly. She is taking them because the drugs were offered to her on a compassionate basis, cost-free. Just in case she may be required to travel to the United States for further specialized treatment, friends and family have arranged fundraising events along with a GoFundMe campaign at Kayla's Fight Club.