Ken York is a hospice nurse and director of nursing in Reno. As someone who always brings joy and happiness out of everyone around him, he beat all the odds in surviving his stage 3 rectal cancer. He credits Dr. Dasari’s patient-centered approach and phytonutient prescribed diet to saving his life.
[Music] my name is Kenneth York and I am a hospice nurse I’m now Director of Nursing in Reno well this situation that occurred lately did make me proud was the way that we handled my last surgery being that cancer survivors definitely in the top five now in my life I’ve been on this planet about half a century and I’ve done a lot of things I’m kind of the Forrest Gump of Nevada and I was a track guy I know you don’t you don’t see that in me but I was a hundred two hundred meter pole-vault and long jump champion in high school and I went to become a decathlete in college it was a proud moment I got injured I had to play football so I bulked up for that I don’t know I’m a big guy and then when that didn’t work out for things of life that don’t work out you go out of the next I became a music teacher I’m very proud of that in there for 12 years doc killed Rijn I was after my performance levels of being you know an opera singer and playing in the symphonies so those are probably the top five things besides else while passing nursing school which was probably the hardest things I ever did in my life you know getting so those are my public like top five or six proud moments the one thing I’ll say about ken is he’ll always make you laugh and even when I met him even when we were talking about cancer he was always able to put a smile on my face and I’m a pretty stoic person in general he probably does this with a lot of his other patients too puts it puts their mind at ease makes him feel relaxed makes him go through the dying process with dignity and levity I found out I had cancer from just going to the bathroom first I knew it my wife didn’t think so every polyps and I turned 50 I was gonna do my 50-year check and bam guess here’s your 50-year birthday gift you know so I’m go to the bathroom and in not to be descriptive but it was like a play-doh machine when you press down on a play-doh machine you put the plate on it and it’s really pressure to get it out that’s what was feeling and then would come out like stars or moons like the different shape would come out wrong so I knew I had something very wrong with me so when I went in to get the cancer checked when I woke up he said you have cancer and I said and that’s when I I was crying and I was going okay and my wife just became super brave she said we’re gonna kick its ass ken is a hospice nurse he takes care of dying patients every day he takes care of people that are end-stage cancer so when he came to me with a new diagnosis of rectal cancer stage 3 he was afraid he was afraid of having to deal with the pain and suffering he’s seen so many other patients experience in his own practice I wish I would have known to eat differently I’ve changed my diet extensively in the last nine to ten months I eat very poorly you know you try to put thousands of calories into your body so you could be a big man it’s you they don’t make small centers in football so you have to be a big man and I just kept packing on the bad things I think the red needs the things that I was eating was causing this thing to occur and so I think it would change my diet I think that would be the biggest thing the worst struggle was the seven weeks after you gave me the surgery and we fought I some I get your body just reacts funny like in a car accident way you don’t remember things I don’t remember a lot of details of the things that occurred to me during those seven weeks but I remember the highlights and how difficult it was on myself you my family that was a really tough time really tough period but as you can see I’m a pretty positive guy you saw me fight all the way and I continued to do that every day I don’t take anything for granted down his surgery was challenging his cancer was very close to his sphincter he was a heavyset guy but we were able to remove it all we were able to get the entire thing out and preserve his sphincter function which is an amazing thing when he considered rectal cancer it can be so damaging how what brought me to dr. Chandra da sorry was I had a friend who was a doctor was married to my but he married my best friends his best friend was ready to my best friend and I went to him and I asked him for advice and he had heard that dr. Chandra depend on Surya in town was the best and said go to him and so that’s what I did you follow your doctor’s friends in your circle you know I like that he understood me I’m a spaz I’m a different kind of person and I’m highly passionate and highly emotional and a lot of doctors don’t read me right they don’t they don’t see me for who I am dr.
das he sees me if I come in angry and say you’re so-and-so he just lets it slide off his shoulders he understands what I’m going through that I come on tell him I love them or I’ll come out and hug them or I’ll get physical or a fun or I’ll yell at him or all these emotional things that go through he reads right through that knows who I am and a lot of doctors don’t how to read like that you go to a doctor they just give you the straight facts and they let you go but dr. das tree takes the time to really listen and understand what you’re going through and understand your emotions and be part of your life which is really rare with doctors I know we had with it the disease when I was walking and doing laps around my car and 115° with Keith my good friend to my side walking me around the side of the car up and down that driveway and I was doing 10 15 laps around it and I was eating better again and I was going to the bathroom I self that’s how I knew I was gonna make it Kenna was a rock star when it came to surgery that guy was walking the day after he got operated on he was telling all the nurses as he was making laps joking with him he was just great he was such a great great person to take care of he really believed in nutrition he really believed in exercise he lost quite a bit of weight prior to his surgery and his surgery went quite well we were very happy with the results on what the hospice nurse what I do is I go make people comfortable I understand the disease process ever even better than I did before I’m able to understand what a person says I’m done I can’t do this this chemo and this radiation again another round I’ve been there I know what it does to you and so I can take him through that that next phase and say I get it here’s what I did and let’s get you through this next comfortable phase and I think that later on I’ll be joining those organizations when my life settles back in now he comes in my office every few months and just gives me a hard time and just jokes with me and tell asked me when we’re gonna grab some beers it’s great it’s great to have a friend like that and it’s great to get to know someone like that someone who continues to take care of patients to this day it’s an honor to have taken care of him you know everybody says live for the day they don’t mean it if you’re laying in a bed and you’re dying and you’re sitting there for seven weeks in a bed it’s very lonely you have a long time to think about what’s going to happen when you get out of that bed and I made certain promises to people that I was gonna change and I did the diet I got to be here for my wife I got to be here for dr.
