A lung cancer diagnosis raises urgent questions about treatment. For young adults, it also raises ones that too often go unspoken: Can I still have children? Is it too late once treatment starts? And whose job is it to bring this up?

Host Leah Phillips sits down with Dr. Narjust Florez, thoracic oncologist and co-founder & co-director of the Young Lung Cancer Program at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and Taryn Lipner, program administrator, for an honest conversation about fertility preservation and family building after a lung cancer diagnosis.

The core message: fertility is health care, and raising it is the oncology team's responsibility, not one more thing patients should have to remember. Dr. Florez breaks down why the belief that "if you didn't do it at the beginning, you can't do it later" is "very 2003," walks through the real options for men and women, and explains what's possible even when treatment can't wait.

In this episode:

• Why fertility is part of cancer care, not an afterthought
• Why starting the conversation is the care team's job, not the patient's
• Fertility preservation options for men and women
• What to do when treatment can't wait
• How chemo, radiation, and immunotherapy affect fertility
• Building a family beyond biology: adoption, surrogacy, donation
• Navigating costs, insurance, and financial support

Chapters (verify against final edit):
00:00 Introduction
00:54 Whose responsibility it is to start the conversation
02:39 Fertility preservation options
05:54 Does fertility recover after treatment?
06:32 When treatment has to start right away
08:19 Advice for the newly diagnosed
10:14 Informational visits and the financial side
11:32 Family building beyond pregnancy
12:43 How treatments affect fertility
14:48 One message every young patient should hear

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Disclaimer: This conversation is for educational purposes only. Always talk to a healthcare professional about your individual situation.

When you're diagnosed with HER2 lung cancer, most people around you have never heard of it. In this final episode, Samantha and Loryn talk about what it meant to find each other and a community that actually understands. They cover where to find other HER2 patients, how social media opened doors that didn't exist before, what YLCI has meant to both of them, and why connection changes how you navigate this disease.
This is Part 3 of a 3-part conversation. Watch Parts 1 and 2 on our channel.

Thanks to Boehringer Ingelheim for sponsoring this series.

YLCI retains full editorial control.

Chapters:
00:00 The Importance of Community in Cancer Journeys
02:17 Finding HER2 Positive Lung Cancer Patients
04:11 The Role of Social Media in Advocacy
06:46 The Impact of Young Lung Cancer Initiative
08:58 Navigating Support Systems
11:44 Building Connections and Future Initiatives


This content is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

Two women with HER2 driven lung cancer open up about what treatment, grief, and living with stage 4 really looks like from the inside. This is what people don't see.
Samantha and Loryn were both diagnosed with HER2 lung cancer in their 30s. In this episode they share what their treatment journeys actually looked like, why second opinions changed everything, how a stage 4 lung cancer diagnosis reshapes your identity and relationships, and what they're still grieving that the people around them never see.
HER2 mutated ung cancer affects roughly 2 to 4 percent of lung cancer patients. But the medical side is only part of the story. This conversation goes deeper into what it means to live with this diagnosis as a young person, a parent, a partner, and a patient who is still figuring out how to plan for a future that feels uncertain.
Topics covered in this episode:
What HER2 lung cancer treatment actually looks like, including traditional chemotherapy, targeted therapy, and when to consider switching
Why both Samantha and Loryn sought multiple opinions and how that shaped their care
How lung cancer changes your sense of identity when the things that defined you start to shift
The impact on careers, relationships, and the caregiver-patient dynamic
What it feels like to grieve your future while still being here
How to balance planning ahead with living in the present when you scan every few months

Thanks to Boehringer Ingelheim for sponsoring this series.

YLCI retains full editorial control.

Chapters:
00:00 Navigating the Journey of HER2 Lung Cancer
01:37 Treatment Experiences and Decisions
03:27 The Importance of Second Opinions
04:48 Advocating for Yourself in Treatment
06:41 Impact on Personal Identity
09:16 Changes in Relationships and Daily Life
12:22 Emotional Challenges of Cancer
16:22 Balancing Future Planning with Present Living

⚠️ Disclaimer
This content is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

"I Googled it. It says poor prognosis. It put me in a really dark place." -Samantha
Samantha Murrell and Loryn Fadus are two young women living with HER2 mutated ung cancer. In this first conversation, they sit down with YLCI co-founder Leah Phillips to talk about the road to diagnosis- the missed windows, the misdiagnoses, the shock of hearing "stage four," and what they wish they had known from the start.

This is Part 1 of a three-part conversation. Parts 2 and 3 cover treatment decisions, living with HER2 lung cancer, and what community has meant to both of them.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction
00:53 Samantha's first symptoms
02:32 Hearing the diagnosis
03:42 Stage four and an initial prognosis
04:30 Discovering HER2 Exon 20 Mutation through biomarker testing
05:23 "I thought lung cancer was the one I couldn't get"
07:14 Loryn's symptoms and the path to diagnosis
13:44 Learning about HER2 and finding hope
15:02 What to tell your newly diagnosed self
16:02 Misunderstandings about oncogene driven lung cancer
18:32 What's coming in Part 2

This series is proudly sponsored by Boehringer Ingelheim. YLCI retains full editorial control of all content.

⚠️ Disclaimer
This content is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

In Part 3 of our HER2-driven lung cancer series, Leah Phillips and thoracic medical oncologist Dr. Kyle Concannon (UC Health, University of Colorado) tackle the harder questions. They get into what resistance actually means, the difference between on-target and off-target resistance, why a cancer can sometimes transform into a different type entirely, and the emerging research and combination approaches being studied for HER2 lung cancer patients.

This is a conversation many patients will eventually need to have. The research is moving fast and there is real reason for hope.

Thanks to Boehringer Ingelheim for supporting this series. YLCI retains full editorial control.

This content is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

Once you know you have HER2 lung cancer, what comes next? In Part 2 of our HER2-driven lung cancer series, Leah Phillips and thoracic medical oncologist Dr. Kyle Concannon (UC Health, University of Colorado) walk through what treatment actually looks like. They cover how first-line decisions are made for early versus advanced disease, where HER2-targeted therapies fit in, how doctors tell whether a treatment is working, what brain monitoring looks like, and what a progression conversation involves.

Whether you're newly diagnosed or supporting someone through treatment, this episode will help you walk into your next oncology appointment more prepared.

Thanks to Boehringer Ingelheim for supporting this series.

YLCI retains full editorial control.

This content is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

In lung cancer, HER2 can mean different things.
In Part 1 of our HER2-driven lung cancer series, Leah Phillips sits down with thoracic medical oncologist Dr. Kyle Concannon (UC Health, University of Colorado) to cover the basics: what a HER2 alteration actually is, the difference between overexpression, amplification, and the exon 20 insertion mutation, why the type matters for treatment, and why next-generation sequencing at diagnosis is non-negotiable.
This is Part 1 of 3. Parts 2 and 3 cover treatment and monitoring, then resistance and emerging research.

About Dr. Kyle Concannon: Assistant Professor of Medicine-Medical Oncology at the University of Colorado and a thoracic medical oncologist at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital. Trained as a physician-scientist at MD Anderson, his lab studies why oncogene-driven lung cancers (EGFR, HER2, ALK, ROS1) stop responding to therapy and how to overcome that resistance. He also co-hosts The @crackingcancer podcast
https://som.cuanschutz.edu/Profiles/Faculty/Profile/40545

This series is proudly sponsored by Boehringer Ingelheim.

This is educational content. Not medical advice. Always talk to your own care team about your specific situation.

"We put out the fire. This is the last ember."
In Part 3, Mayya Grinberg breaks down how she secured a second opinion with one of the world's leading ALK+ specialists before she needed one, how she navigated the radiation decision, and what no one prepared her for when the side effects hit eight weeks later.
If you are navigating treatment decisions with a targetable mutation, this one is for you.

Chapters:
0:00 — Introduction
0:18 — Getting a second opinion before you need one
1:00 — Finding Dr. Alice Shaw at Mass General
3:51 — What the second opinion confirmed
4:19 — Surgery vs. radiation: how she decided
7:21 — Radiation Side Effects
9:40 — Pulmonary PT and recovery

⚠️ Disclaimer
This content is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions regarding a medical condition.

📢 Amplifying the Voices of Young-Onset Lung Cancer
Lung cancer is often caught late in young adults because "they're too young." At the Young Lung Cancer Initiative (YLCI), we are changing that narrative. We are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to providing support, research, and advocacy for the young-onset community.