Wayne and Susan I.

In November of 2022, Wayne was having trouble swallowing food, so he made an appointment with his family physician. Following an exam, his physician ordered an esophageal dilation, a procedure that allows a surgeon to dilate, or stretch, a narrowed area of the patient’s esophagus.

During the treatment, Benjamin Chiu, MD, and a surgeon at Community Howard Regional Health, found a tumor.

“He wasn’t back there but fifteen minutes,” said Susan, Wayne’s wife of more than 16 years. “He (Dr. Chiu) walked in and said he had bad news and pictures. I was devastated and felt everything -  fear, anger, everything.”

Wayne was still sedated during this conversation and Susan knew that he would know by the look on her face something was wrong when he woke. So, she decided to tell him when he opened his eyes.

Wayne, who served Howard County for 33 years and retired as a deputy sheriff, started radiation to treat the stage IV tumor in January of 2023. Currently, he is very proud to serve the students and faculty of Maconaquah School Corporation as their Police Chief.

“I had 26 treatments of radiation, daily except for weekends,” Wayne said. Later, he received a feeding tube, a port and three types of chemotherapy. 

One night that same January, Susan woke up with severe abdominal pain. “So, I didn’t know I was sick, and I had symptoms but didn’t think about them,” Susan said. “We had a lot going on, but I knew something was wrong.”

She went to the emergency department at a local hospital, where the staff immediately began examining her. Following a CT scan, a physician informed Susan that she had a small bowel obstruction, because the scan showed she had tumors in her abdomen. She was hospitalized with a feeding tube for three days.

Following discharge, Wayne wanted Susan to be treated at Community MD Anderson Cancer Center – Kokomo, where he receives his care. Diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, Susan was referred to Annette Moore, MD, medical oncologist, who developed a treatment plan that would include six months of chemotherapy.

Sometimes, Wayne and Susan’s appointments to receive chemotherapy would overlap, allowing them to receive treatment side-by-side and hold hands.

Susan is a hair stylist and owner of Sunburst Salon and Day Spa in Kokomo, and she needed to keep working during treatment, and to care for Wayne.

“There were days that were difficult,” Susan said. “But I am self-employed, and I am thankful my clients and staff were wonderful during my weeks of treatment.”

For a period of time, both Wayne and Susan were on liquid diets. “Wayne was nothing but liquids, when not using his feeding tube,” Susan said. “When I got sick, I was also on nothing but liquids.”

That’s when support from Community Health Network Foundation’s Oncology Patient Assistance Fund came at the right time. That fund is supported by philanthropy and connects cancer patients in need to food, medicine, transportation, and housing and utilities assistance. 

“We received four gift cards that we would use to buy protein drinks,” Susan said. “That was wonderful for us. We also used them to buy frozen fruits so I could make us smoothies. It’s incredibly generous for donors to support this and was a total surprise! We are so grateful!”

In addition, Wayne said they used the gift cards to buy new clothes, since he lost more than seventy pounds and Susan had lost more than twenty pounds during treatments.

Currently, both Wayne and Susan are cancer free. 

Under the care of John Salter, MD, medical oncologist, Wayne was referred to a specialist at Parkview Health where he received two successful cryoablations, procedures that use extremely cold gas to freeze and destroy diseased tissue or abnormal cells. He receives immunotherapy at Community MD Anderson Cancer Center – Kokomo, monitoring, and PET scans every three months. 

Susan is also still in treatment, receiving targeted therapy every two months for the next year. Both are thankful for the care they receive at Community MD Anderson Cancer Center – Kokomo.

“We feel like they truly care for us,” Susan said. “Every time either one of us has an appointment, someone always asks us how the other one is doing!”