Surviving Cancer as a Doctor: The Story She Was Ready to Share

Описание: Hosted by Priya Rao, MD, this episode features Dr. Kerri Glasner, a gastroenterologist diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma, a rare and often fatal bile duct cancer.

They examine what it means to face a life-threatening cancer diagnosis as a physician and how surviving a liver transplant reshaped how she practices medicine, understands pain, and lives her life.

What’s Covered in This Episode:
◼️ Being diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma as a young physician
◼️ Understanding your own cancer prognosis through medical training
◼️ Chemotherapy, radiation, and qualifying for a liver transplant
◼️ ICU complications, extreme pain, and not being believed
◼️ Loss of control and vulnerability after becoming the patient
◼️ Returning to clinical work before being ready
◼️ Medical PTSD and avoidance after critical illness
◼️ Leaving an academic role after surviving cancer
◼️ Reprioritizing family, time, and work after facing mortality
◼️ How surviving cancer changed how she practices medicine

Jump to Key Moments
00:00 — Diagnosing bile duct cancer as a physician
03:00 — Prognosis and treatment decisions
11:40 — Chemotherapy, radiation, and transplant eligibility
16:50 — ICU trauma and loss of control
22:15 — Severe pain and not being believed
27:45 — How illness changed her medical practice
31:00 — Leaving an academic role after trauma
36:15 — Returning to work too soon
41:30 — Belief, survival, and meaning
45:45 — What living with an open heart means now

In this conversation, Kerri shares what it was like to receive that diagnosis as a physician and new mother, fully understanding the prognosis from her medical training. She walks through undergoing chemotherapy and radiation, qualifying for a liver transplant that most patients with cholangiocarcinoma never reach, and surviving a complex surgery that included a liver transplant and a Whipple procedure.

Kerri describes the complications that followed, including liver necrosis, pancreatic leaks, prolonged ICU care, and severe postoperative pain. She speaks candidly about being told her pain was “out of proportion,” the loss of control that comes with critical illness, and how different the patient experience feels when you are on the other side of the bed.

The conversation also explores what happens after survival. Returning to clinical work before fully recovering. The quiet pressure physicians feel to function as if nothing happened. Medical trauma and avoidance after time in the ICU. Why going back to the same institution where the trauma occurred can be destabilizing. How becoming a patient changed the way she listens to pain, intuition, and fear in her own patients.

Kerri also shares the life changes she made after surviving cancer, including leaving an academic role, moving closer to family, working fewer days, and redefining what matters most. She reflects on faith, uncertainty, intuition, and what it means to live with an open heart after facing mortality.

This is the first time Kerri has shared her story publicly.

Open Heart is a space for grounded conversations examining where medical systems, professional training, and conventional frameworks fail to fully account for lived human experience, especially in life transformations.

Hosted by Priya Rao, MD.
Instagram:   / openheartthepod  
LinkedIn:   / about  
Website: https://openheartpodcast.com/

Our Sponsors
Thank you to our sponsors for supporting this episode:
Don’t Miss a Beat: https://linktr.ee/dontmissabeat
Summit Wealth Financial Advisors: https://www.summitwealthgroup.com/

Subscribe to Open Heart with Priya Rao, MD for grounded conversations with people who are curious about intuition, meaning, and different ways of understanding healing and human experience.