Keith Sievers Finds His "Warrior Mode"

Meeting, and joining, the care team

Like other new Winship patients, Sievers—together with his wife, Robin Sievers—came in to meet the Winship team who would be caring for him.

The surgery would be performed by H. Michael Baddour, Jr., MD, an expert in head and neck surgical oncology and complex microvascular reconstruction at Winship, and associate professor in the Department of Otolaryngology at Emory University School of Medicine.

His team also included Soumon Rudra, MD, a Winship researcher and radiation oncologist specializing in the treatment of head and neck cancer and gastrointestinal cancer, and assistant professor at Emory University School of Medicine.

His medical oncologist was Nabil F. Saba, MD, FACP, director of Head and Neck Oncology and the Lynne and Howard Halpern Chair in Head and Neck Cancer Research at Winship and professor at Emory University School of Medicine.

The daylong visit also included meetings with a dental oncologist, pharmacologist, speech therapist and even a swallowing therapist.

Baddour emphasizes that Sievers himself—and each one of his other patients—is “the primary person on the team.” He explains, “They are the ultimate decision-makers driving their own care. And I feel like the only way they can make a decision is if they have all the information.”

Saba says, “Having patients actively participate in the decision-making is important to navigate the complex treatment programs.” He adds, “I think trust is a key ingredient of success.”

Sievers agrees. “You have to trust your doctors,” he says. “You have to stay with them. You have to take their advice. It’s important that you really understand the options and the treatments. Don’t be afraid to ask questions.”

Most important of all, says Sievers, is to recognize in the partnership “how hard these people are working, and how difficult their jobs are. You really have to show them that you respect what they’re doing, and that you appreciate them.”

Sievers’ team recommended the surgery. He had the surgery within a couple of weeks, followed by proton radiation therapy.

Complicating an already difficult experience, Sievers’ personal drama played out against the backdrop of the growing COVID-19 pandemic. Loved ones were routinely barred from visiting family members or friends in hospitals because of the rampant fear of contagion. “I had to drop him off at the curb for the surgery,” Robin Sievers recalls. “I couldn't go in the hospital, and that was hard for both of us.”

By the end of his second year with cancer—which had included surgery, proton therapy and recovery—Sievers was receiving scans every three months. That’s how he found out the cancer had spread into his lung. “It was a fairly significant tumor,” he says with understatement.

Deciding to “leave it in”

Both Sievers met with Saba. This time Saba explained that going after the tumor with radiotherapy may not be sufficient to achieve long-term control; “zapping it” couldn’t guarantee Keith’s survival when the cancer already had recurred before. He recalls Saba as saying, “Look, it’s spread three times. We need to be concerned about the bigger picture.”

After discussing traditional treatments as well as potential treatments being tested in clinical trials, “We elected to go with the trial,” says Sievers.

As it happens, the choice to participate in the clinical trial was an auspicious one.

“At the end of five months,” says Sievers, “the tumor was gone, a complete response.” He adds, “And, knock on wood, I’ve been clean ever since.”

Getting to this point was not easy. Every two weeks, the Sievers made the 70-mile drive each way from their home in the north Georgia mountains to Atlanta, so Keith could receive what he calls “a miracle drug” because of how he says it “really stamped out the cancer.” The drug was an immunotherapy drug being tested in the trial with or without another agent called cetuximab.

As of the time of our interview, in December 2023, Sievers returns to Winship every three months for a set of scans, and every six weeks to have the port flushed. He doesn’t even have to take maintenance medication.

"Winning the war"

He had to push past claustrophobia to be able to remain strapped to a table for 45 minutes—with a full facial mask covering his face—to receive proton therapy on his neck. “I took pride in that,” he says.

“Winning those little victories is uplifting to people,” Sievers says. “If you look at it like a fight, and you look at it like, ‘I may lose a battle or two along the way, but I’m going to win this war’ and you really focus on winning the battles, that really is uplifting and helps to win the war.”