Rosalia Viterbo, MD, FACS

My journey with kidney cancer actually started when I fell in my driveway and injured my eye. I had to go to the hospital for treatment, and they gave me anesthesia before stitching up the eye. After they sent me home, I had trouble urinating.

The doctors said it was probably a side effect of the anesthesia. But a couple of days later, when I had to go back to the hospital for a follow-up procedure, it hadn’t gotten better. By then, my bladder was so full I felt like I would explode.

Now that I’m 74 and retired, I spend most of my time outside or in the garage. Since my service in the Navy, where I worked as a ship fitter, taking care of the plumbing and mechanical issues, I’ve always been fascinated with machines and how they work. So for me, as crazy as it seems to my wife, working outside, tinkering with machines, and splitting wood, isn’t hard work – it’s my playtime.

When Jack Pressman was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2009, his urologist recommended he be treated at Fox Chase Cancer Center. At preadmission testing, Fox Chase pathologists detected a small lesion on his kidney. Dr. Rosalia Viterbo, who was treating Jack, recommended a prostatectomy and then a partial nephrectomy to remove the tumor and a portion of his kidney, once he recovered from the first surgery. Both procedures, which used the robotic approach, were a success. "All of the people at Fox Chase are terrific," he said. "I have been to my share of hospitals over the years, but I have never met so many nice people as I met at Fox Chase. They don’t keep you waiting, and it is easy to tell that they really care about their patients."

When Mike Phillips was diagnosed with kidney cancer, he sought treatment at Fox Chase Cancer Center, where he underwent a partial nephrectomy. Unfortunately, the cancer returned six years later, in 2011, and this time both kidneys were affected. During this time, Mike was also having other health complications, including prostate cancer and a left hemispheric stroke that had no residual effects. In 2015, he received a kidney transplant and has been doing well since. "Now, fully recovered, I continue to do part-time business consulting, given my 45 years of business experience, 30 years in the world of franchising, and 15 in senior care/housing," Mike said, adding, "I hope to start volunteering soon at Fox Chase to provide phone counseling for patients who are dealing with cancer. My advice to others is to be the boss; it is your body, and you must be the captain of your ship."