|
The Fight of a Lifetime
 When Scott Zeberlein found out he had one of the deadliest forms of cancer, he put on his boxing gloves.
“I got mad and I stayed mad. I said, ‘You want a fight? You’ve got it!’” said Zeberlein. That determination helped him beat pancreatic cancer.
Zeberlein’s battle began in July 2005. He was experiencing back pain that would not subside. He visited different doctors and spent four days in the hospital being treated for pancreatitis. Still, he did not get better.
In February 2006, Zeberlein was back in his doctor’s office, this time for jaundice. His doctor tried to examine the pancreas with a scope, but the organ was so swollen, he could not perform the procedure. Zeberlein was then referred to Steven T. Brower, M.D., a renowned surgical oncologist and pancreatic cancer expert at the Curtis and Elizabeth Anderson Cancer Institute (ACI) at Memorial University Medical Center.
The first thing Brower did was place a stent in Zeberlein’s bile duct to ease the swelling. He was then able to take a biopsy of Zeberlein’s pancreas to test for cancer. In April 2006, at age 45, Scott Zeberlein was officially told he had pancreatic cancer.
“I told my folks and we went to the Internet looking for information,” said Zeberlein. What he found was that pancreatic cancer typically has a one-year survival rate of 20 percent and a five-year survival rate of less than 5 percent.
“Basically, everything I read said, ‘you’re dead.’ It was depressing. That’s when I started to get mad. I knew I could pull through this. I’m stubborn,” said Zeberlein.
To fight the cancer, Zeberlein first underwent a major surgery called a Whipple procedure. Brower removed Zeberlein’s duodenum, gallbladder, and part of his stomach. In May and June, Zeberlein received radiation treatment at the ACI and chemotherapy with O. George Negrea, M.D., medical oncologist.
In August, Brower was ready to perform a second surgery to remove any remaining cancerous cells. Unfortunately, he found that a major vessel in Zeberlein’s liver was damaged. The scheduled surgery was changed to a liver repair and Zeberlein was sent back to the recovery room. Finally, in September, he was able to undergo the final surgery to remove the cancer.
It was not an easy road for Zeberlein. He was unable to eat for a long time. He lost 200 pounds and suffered from an infection that put him back in the hospital yet again. In December 2007, he endured a fourth surgery to correct an abdominal hernia. But, he pulled through everything and is cancer-free today.
Zeberlein credits several people for helping him fight.
“I had the two best doctors anybody could ask for, Dr. Brower and Dr. Negrea,” said Zeberlein. He knows he was fortunate to receive world-class treatment right here in Savannah, at the ACI. Because he could receive treatment locally, he was able to stay close to his family and his very supportive girlfriend, Donna. In fact, on February 14, 2009, Zeberlein married Donna and they began building a life together. It’s a life that, according to the statistics, Zeberlein was not supposed to have. Fortunately, he’s not a big believer in statistics -- nor is he afraid of a good fight.
|