Early Detection Helps Treat Pancreatic Cancer at ‘Curable Stage’
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Judy Ethen loves looking forward far more than looking back.
After surviving multiple bouts of cancer and losing several family members to the disease, Judy knows it’s important to be front and center for family activities and gatherings.
She and her husband, Adrian, keep busy chasing after three grown sons and six grandchildren in their home state of Minnesota.
“I can’t get enough football games, soccer games, baseball games, music recitals and family times,” she says. “I refuse to be tied back. I’m very social, I prefer it that way. I find that if you dwell on yourself, it's a downer.”
The second youngest of 10 children, Judy lost her father and a brother to pancreatic cancer. Two more brothers died of cancer of the liver and esophagus. Judy was treated for thyroid cancer in the 2000s and underwent a mastectomy to treat breast cancer in 2016. In 2020, she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.
“I’ve had cancer scares over the years,” she says.
Early Detection of Pancreatic Cancer
Her latest diagnosis stemmed from Mayo Clinic's initiative focused on early detection of pancreatic cancer, which allows patients to be treated at a more survivable stage.
“I was told at the beginning that there are life expectancy issues,” Judy says. “They told me right up front that when they deal with pancreatic cancer, it’s advanced. They were telling me kind of groundbreaking things.”
According to the National Cancer Institute, pancreatic cancer accounts for only 3.2% of all new cancer cases, but it is the third-leading cause of cancer deaths. The five-year pancreatic cancer survival rate is 11.5%.
More than half of patients with pancreatic cancer are diagnosed at a late stage when treatment is far more challenging. That’s because patients typically don’t experience symptoms of pancreatic cancer — including loss of appetite, belly pain, weight loss and yellowing of the skin and eyes — until the disease has spread to other organs. Patients who are diagnosed at an early stage have improved survival.
Physicians currently do not have a good way to screen large portions of the population for pancreatic cancer. While mammograms and colonoscopies are widely used to screen for breast and colon cancers, there isn’t a similar, age-specific, population-level test for pancreatic cancer.
“It’s not a very common cancer, but it’s very lethal. This makes screening challenging,” said Shounak Majumder, M.D., a Mayo Clinic gastroenterologist and pancreatologist.
Finding ‘Curable-Stage Cancer’
In 2008, a cousin told Judy about a study being conducted by the late Gloria Petersen, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic scientist who was the Purvis and Roberta Tabor Professor at the time. Judy’s cousin, Bill Schmidt, had lost both of his parents to pancreatic cancer and knew of Judy’s family history.
Through the study, Judy and Bill became patients of Mayo Clinic’s High-Risk Pancreas Clinic in Rochester.
The clinic is one way Mayo Clinic is working to find what Dr. Majumder calls “curable-stage cancer.”
A research team led by Dr. Majumder and supported by a generous $22.1 million gift from The Centene Charitable Foundation is developing an early detection strategy, with the High-Risk Pancreas Clinic serving as a translational research hub.
Patients who have a high risk of pancreatic cancer — because of a genetic mutation or family history of the disease — are regularly screened in hopes of detecting the cancer early.
“We really want to intercept it at a stage where we can make a meaningful impact in that patient’s journey,” Dr. Majumder says. “We find it early, we treat it aggressively, and that leads to better outcomes for the patient.”
Patients in the high-risk pancreas clinic also can participate in a research registry and clinical trials. Mayo Clinic’s High-Risk Pancreas Clinic research registry follows these patients over time and is linked to a longitudinal bank of biospecimens and images, making it possible for researchers to innovate and create novel screening tools.
“It’s our opportunity to serve these high-risk patients, and it’s also advancing our research mission,” Dr. Majumder said. “Our fellows participate in the care of these patients, so we are also educating the next generation of gastroenterologists. It truly serves the three-shield mission of Mayo Clinic.”
Lifesaving Surgery
Through the study Judy learned she carries a genetic mutation that increases her likelihood of developing pancreatic cancer.
Judy began annual screenings, including CT and MRI scans and endoscopy, at Mayo Clinic. In 2020, after more than a decade of surveillance, during a routine screening visit she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She was asymptomatic and her cancer was detected at an early stage. Dr. Majumder referred her to Mark Truty, M.D., M.S.
After six months of chemotherapy and two months of radiation, Dr. Truty performed surgery in August 2021 to remove her pancreas, spleen and gallbladder. She spent 3½ weeks at Mayo Clinic Hospital, Saint Marys Campus, before returning home to recover.
“Dr. Truty saved my life,” Judy says, “What I choose to do with the remainder of my time, I’ll have because of him.”
In 2024 following successful treatment of pancreatic cancer, Judy is participating in a clinical trial at Mayo Clinic to treat cancer in her lungs. She is optimistic that the monotherapy treatment will slow the cancer’s growth and hopes her experience can contribute to cancer research. Judy credits her husband, Adrian, and her sons for their support. Additionally, none of their sons carry the genetic mutation she does.
“We are so blessed,” Judy says. "That was the best news I've ever heard in my life.”
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