In this CBS Colorado video, lung cancer specialist Dr Ross Camidge speaks openly about his own diagnosis. He explains why he kept it private for a long time, how he is learning to live with it, and what that means for his work and for other patients. A powerful testimony about hope, science and humanity.
Source: CBS Colorado, Colorado lung cancer doctor Ross Camidge reveals his own diagnosis to help others [Video] – 17-11-2025. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvOljLhoc3Y
He is a world-renowned expert in lung cancer, known for helping patients from dozens of other states and countries live longer and fuller lives. Despite a stark diagnosis of his own, Dr Camidge has spent decades studying lung cancer and its treatments at the CU Cancer Center in Aurora. And as our reporter in Aurora, Kelly Werthmann, shows, it has become a deeply personal mission.
Dr Ross Camidge: “I look at that and I think: that’s damn well lung cancer.”
For more than 20 years, Dr Ross Camidge has been on the front line of lung cancer research. Over the past decade we have shared stories about how he helps patients around the world beat the odds.
Dr Ross Camidge: “I have people who were in their twenties when they were diagnosed and who are now in their fifties.”
Much of Dr Camidge’s work focuses on developing anti-cancer medication and studying scans like these.
Dr Ross Camidge: “So I looked at this and knew immediately that it had spread.”
The images show the advanced stage and spread of lung cancer in a patient. And that patient is Dr Camidge himself.
Dr Ross Camidge: “A little over three years ago I was diagnosed with lung cancer, but I kept that diagnosis secret.”
He says it began with wheezing and a painful shoulder — symptoms he assumed came from a heavy gym session — until an X-ray showed something else.
Dr Ross Camidge: “Within about four days I went from ‘oh, I think I’ve pulled something at the gym’ to knowing I had stage four, advanced, incurable lung cancer.”
For years Dr Camidge kept his diagnosis of advanced, non-smoking-related lung cancer private, to protect his children and his patients. But he now speaks openly about it to show that some cancers can be managed, like a chronic illness.
Dr Ross Camidge: “To take away the idea that a cancer diagnosis equals, you know, the end of your worth.”
“Are you angry, doctor, that you have the same diagnosis you have been researching for so long?”
“Nobody has ever asked me that. No. And this may sound bizarre, but within literally a few days I reasoned that it was a privilege to have it — that I could stand in the shoes of all those patients I have had before.”
For Dr Camidge, living with cancer is not only possible; it is also a deliberate calling.
Dr Ross Camidge: “That is the evidence of what you can still do. Even after an advanced diagnosis. And I am still here.”