What happened, in summary

Derek Cooney, an emergency physician, was 48 when difficulty eating and drinking led to testing and a diagnosis of diffuse gastric adenocarcinoma. A laparoscopy showed that the cancer had spread to his peritoneum, making it Stage IV.

Derek began with 8 rounds of FLOT chemotherapy using fluorouracil, leucovorin, oxaliplatin and docetaxel. He then joined an MD Anderson clinical trial that added paclitaxel delivered directly into the abdominal cavity. A port was placed and superficial abdominal lesions were removed, followed by 3 paclitaxel cycles every 2 weeks. On January 28, 2025, he underwent total gastrectomy, cytoreductive surgery and HIPEC. After a month of recovery, he completed 3 more paclitaxel cycles.

At his first follow-up in June, scans showed no evidence of disease. Cancer had delayed Derek's planned fellowship in interventional pain management, but he later completed it and returned to medicine with a renewed focus on sleep, time away from work and family life.