- In 2020, Sam Gee, then 14, was diagnosed with melanoma and underwent a new type of therapy.
- A year later, his grandmother, Suzan Taff, 83, was diagnosed with the same type of cancer.
In early 2020, Sam Gee, then 14, felt a lesion on his back that was "noticeably becoming irregular and changing," he told Insider. Then there was the swelling of the lymph nodes in his groin, which Gee and his family thought was a hernia, and which a pediatric surgeon attributed to puberty.
Two months later, he was diagnosed with melanoma, considered the most serious form of skin cancer and one of the most frequently occurring cancers in young adults. It's rarer in young patients like Gee, however — only about 300-400 children and teens are treated for it every year.
Gee, now 17, underwent immunotherapy at the University of Texas' MD Anderson Cancer Center for about a year. Then, right around the time he was finishing treatments, his grandmother Suzan Taff, 83, was diagnosed with the same type of cancer.
Gee underwent immunotherapy, a cutting-edge cancer treatment
Gee started treatment on February 14, 2020. While chemotherapy can be used to treat melanoma, it's seen as less effective for treating this form of cancer than newer treatments like immunotherapy.
Unlike chemotherapy, which is designed to block and destroy cancer cells, immunotherapy strengthens the immune system by helping T-cells, a type of immune system cell, recognize and attack cancer cells in the body.
Gee said the "side effects aren't as bad as chemo," and he mostly experienced fatigue and some nausea during his immunotherapy treatments. For the most part, he was still able to attend school until pandemic lockdowns began a month later. He also had surgery to remove his primary lesion and 31 lymph nodes from his groin, thigh, and pelvis in May 2020, after pandemic lockdowns initially pushed the appointment back.
His grandmother received her diagnosis a few months after he finished his treatment
As Gee completed his last treatment in January 2021, little did his grandmother know she would soon be diagnosed with the same condition.
In October 2021, a few months after Gee was declared cancer free, she decided to see a doctor about a spot on the bottom of her left foot that "looked like a blister that wouldn't heal. "
The doctor biopsied the lesion and came back with the same diagnosis that her grandson had gotten a year before: Melanoma.
She went to the same hospital as her grandson to start her immunotherapy, and eventually received the same medications as him as well. She also had surgery to remove her lesion.
While her treatment has taken longer than Gee's and involved more medications, she said it's "been remarkably easy" and she's had "very few noticeable side effects of any sort."
Her grandson's melanoma treatment prepared her for her own
While Taff remains in treatment, she's hopeful. She says her grandson has been very supportive, and since he has already been through the experience himself, he's always willing to answer any questions she has about what to expect from immunotherapy.
Her grandson's positive experience is "certainly an encouragement," she said.
Throughout this process, she said one of her most memorable experiences with her grandson was attending a luncheon together in November and meeting Dr. Jim Allison, the chair of Immunology at MD Anderson. Allison won the Nobel Prize in 2018 for his innovations in immunotherapy, the treatment that has helped both of them.
"That was a wonderful experience, to be able to express our gratitude to him for perseverance that he demonstrated and getting these drugs approved," Taff said.