Campaign sheds light on deadly disease

Loved ones share stories about pancreatic cancer

Ten years ago Betty Aldridge lost her husband to pancreatic cancer and she fears shes about to go through it again with another family member.

Betty Aldridge of Ottawa, Ont., founder and president of the National Pancreatic Cancer Canada Foundation, was in St. Johns on Wednesday. She gave a presentation at the Health Sciences Centre in the evening. Photo by Joe Gibbons/The Telegram

What are the chances? she says.

Pretty high when you consider the statistics 4,700 Canadians will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and 4,400 will die in 2014, according to http://www.cancer.ca/en/cancer-information/cancer-type/pancreatic/statistics.

Visiting St. Johns from Ottawa, the founder of the National Pancreatic Cancer Canada Foundation is spending this week in the Atlantic provinces to try to raise awareness about the disease, which has a poor prognosis once detected.

Aldridge said her husband was a professional athlete with the Toronto Argonauts in the 60s and 70s and always took care of himself.

She said he was also a teacher who never smoked or drank.

Theres no early detection, no testing. Its pretty devastating. My husband died within six weeks of diagnosis, Aldridge told The Telegram Wednesday.

I not only lost my husband, but now my brother has it, she said.

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Campaign sheds light on deadly disease