Behind the Breakthroughs
The Your Stories Podcast

Hear candid conversations between people conquering cancer — patients, their family and friends, and doctors and researchers working to help us all.

Headshot of Dr. Jyoti Patel. She has shoulder-length black hair, is wearing a black blazer and white blouse, and is smiling facing forward against a dark gray background.
Behind the Breakthroughs
The Power of Patient Education
Imagine you—or a loved one—receives a cancer diagnosis. Overnight, you find yourself trying to become an oncology expert. Instead, you quickly find yourself overwhelmed by big words and lots of jargon. But then you find Cancer.Net.

As the patient information website of Conquer Cancer and the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), this doctor-approved resource makes cancer terminology easier to digest and offers the latest guidelines on research and treatment. For patients and families struggling to make sense of a cancer diagnosis, this kind of easy-to-understand information not only brings relief, but also empowerment. It also plays a critical role in raising awareness and support throughout the cancer community.

“There’s a wealth of information demonstrating that informed and involved patients are more likely to experience better outcomes,” says Dr. Jyoti Patel, a clinical oncologist and the editor-in-chief of Cancer.Net. “Informed patients are more likely to be satisfied with their treatment and care because they understand why they’re doing it.”
Your Stories
The More You Know

Every year in Chicago, ASCO’s Annual Meeting convenes one of the largest and most diverse gatherings in global cancer care. A highlight of this event is the plenary session. It’s when the meeting’s 45,000 attendees gather and listen as the brightest minds in cancer research share some of the year’s biggest discoveries. This year, four of the presenters were former Conquer Cancer grant recipients—an example of the difference donor dollars can make.

Unless you're a trained scientist, most of these findings might not make much sense. Enter Cancer.Net, the patient information website of ASCO and Conquer Cancer, with its wealth of easy-to-understand oncology information and its commitment to helping patients and families access the knowledge and resources they need as they navigate their cancer journey.   

In this episode of Your Stories, host and cancer survivor Brenda Brody is joined by Dr. Jyoti Patel, a clinical oncologist and the editor-in-chief of Cancer.Net. Together, they unpack the complexities of these groundbreaking research discoveries, explain what makes these findings significant for patients, and discuss the long-term impact of donor-funded research. They also discuss why providing understandable cancer information is critical to raising awareness and support.

For the person who has been recently diagnosed with cancer, or who is caring for someone who has been, it’s like parachuting into a land in which you don’t know the language, you don’t have a map or know the topography, and trying to find your way forward.
Dr. Jyoti Patel