At a recent Dodgers game, 14-year-old Keaton looks like any other fan of the home team, with his blue ballcap and Shohei Ohtani t-shirt.
Unlike most other Dodgers fans, however, at this game he was celebrated on the field as a cancer survivor, during Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.
Keaton was among 16 pediatric oncology patients recognized by the Dodgers during the Sept. 9 game against the Chicago Cubs. In April of 2023, he completed treatment for the most common cancer in children, acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
It was a wrenching three-year journey that started just before the COVID-19 pandemic began, says Keaton’s mom, Tamara.
“You’re just thrown into this world that you never knew existed,” she says through tears, recalling Keaton’s diagnosis in January 2020 when he was 9½ years old.
A stomachache and a strange rash
Keaton wasn’t as hungry as usual and complained of a stomachache for about a week before he noticed a strange rash on his arm. His parents brought him to the pediatrician, who suggested a blood test.
The doctor left Tamara and her husband, Steve, an urgent message that evening. When they spoke, he told them to bring Keaton to the emergency department right away.
They would learn his diagnosis that night and spend the next nine days in the hospital as Keaton started receiving chemotherapy.
“It was hell, but we got through it and went home,” Tamara says.
Thus began a cycle of treatments that would last almost until Keaton started high school.
Treating leukemia
In the 1950s, acute lymphoblastic leukemia was considered a deadly disease, says Theodore Moore, MD, chief of pediatric hematology/oncology at UCLA Health. Today, the cure rate for the blood cancer is more than 90%.
“For Keaton, getting through all this, he has a great 95% cure rate to look at (after treatment),” says Dr. Moore, a member of the UCLA Health Johnsson Comprehensive Cancer Center.
While acute lymphoblastic leukemia is the most common cancer in children, it’s still a rare disease, he says, with around 7,000 new cases a year in the U.S. Since the 1960s, doctors from around the world have collaborated on treatment approaches, eventually leading to the combination of medications successfully used today, Dr. Moore says.
“It is arguably one of the most standardized treatments for a cancer in the world,” he says. “Whether you’re here, in Europe or in New York, you’ll be started on the same drugs because the success rate is so high … It’s one of the great successes in cancer.”
Dr. Moore says he is optimistic when a patient’s diagnosis is acute lymphoblastic leukemia because it’s so often curable. Even when it relapses, cure rates are high, he says.
The cause of acute lymphoblastic leukemia is not known.
Looking ahead
Keaton is thriving now. He continued to play soccer during his treatment, along with baseball and basketball. He just joined the tennis team at his high school, where he’s a freshman.
He maintained a positive outlook throughout his treatment and recovery, his mom says. She, however, still has lingering worries.
“I still have fears. Definitely not as many as I did, or as consistent, but if he says, ‘I’m not hungry’ and I go into a worry state,” Tamara says, adding that therapy has helped her process the rollercoaster of emotions she experienced during Keaton’s diagnosis and treatment. “ When my daughter got a rash, I’d take her in to get a blood test. She got a nosebleed, I’d take her in to get a blood test. It affects the entire family.”
That’s partly why going to the Dodgers game as a family was so special. They’d only been to one game before.
“Being at the Dodger game as a family reminded us how many people are out there to support families like ours. We had no idea these communities existed until we were thrust into this world,” Tamara says. “It’s so heartwarming to see people come together to give these kids a chance to just have fun after all they’ve been through.”
