ThePhotoDept Chris Sturm

[AlwaysScience]

Tagrisso, the medication Chris is going to start is about $18,000 per month but it also is taken every month for the rest of the cancer patient’s life.

The FDA approved Tagrisso in February - just 2 months ago and studies show that when combined with chemotherapy it does increase the median number of months patients diagnosed with metastatic non small cell lung cancer live.

 

[TryingMyBest]

Oops - but I was so relieved to see a reasonable post, though I'm confused about the Medicare reference. I found this on the gov't site:

"If you’re getting Social Security disability benefits, you’ll get Medicare automatically after getting disability benefits for 24 months. If you have ALS (also called Lou Gehrig’s disease) you’ll get Medicare automatically as soon as you start getting disability benefits."

I can't find anything that says you can get Medicare automatically if you have cancer - so I think it's just more confusion from Chris. Maybe 'he' doesn't even understand and some social worker is dealing with the details and he just has a vague idea of what's going on.

Maybe he is confusing Medicare with Medicaid.

 

[Elpis]

At about noon today, his time, Chris posted a link to this thread on his Instagram stories! With a screenshot of the first post on page 1, and this caption: "thread about me on tattle.life if anyone wants to read some wild assumptions and armchair experts."

Hi, Chris! We really do hope your treatment goes well!

 

[AlwaysScience]

He said he actually paid for a policy on the ACA (and seemed annoyed that he had to buy it because his work insurance would be available the next month - April). This was just several weeks ago.

Oh and it just occurred to me - didn't he say his "wife" was a nurse? If so, she could put him on her policy. Or if she didn't get insurance through work, she could sign up at the ACA website and put him on her policy that way. But maybe she's just a girlfriend...

What I really think: a whole lotta lying is going on.

But anyway.... yeah, I hope you're right and I'm gonna try to disengage because he annoys me a lot.

It’s his girlfriend who is a nurse.I think they live together.

I think he tried but don’t think he was able to get insurance though ACA because he now is saying he hasn’t been able to get on a “state” program. He said somoen he deals with at the hospital was “surprised.” I would not have been trying to get on the “state” program if he had succeeded in getting insurance via ACA. His “surprise” about not getting on the state program strikes me as entitlement.

I did break down last night and watch his latest video out of curiosity. He is coming across a lot less cocky. My guess is because he found out he can’t “game” the ACA insurance program by only signing o because he has cancer, can‘t get the state to cover his medical expenses, and has gotten a realistic idea from the hospital of what all the cutting edge medical care is going to cost him.

It‘s clear that his followers who comment on his videos are not picking up on this and just feel sorry for him.I aging their outrage if anyone commented about him not being willing to pay for insurance via the ACA when he thought he was healthy, then wanting to get it when he has cancer.

The move to California will be a big deal for his girlfriend.

1. She has had a front row seat to his attitudes - including his admitted stubborn refusal to listen to her about eating healthy for weeks after his diagnosis. Who knows what else he was stubborn about and she works with cancer patients so she had a wealth of useful information to share with him. That is hubris, if not sexism.. Does she want to follow a man like that across the country?

2. She knows he might only live 2 or 3 years after they move so does she want to uproot herself for that? She would start over as a nurse and new nurses often are at a disadvantage versus experienced nurses at work in things like picking shifts and also in terms of being respected.

3. Is he going to marry her or is she going to move across the country to continue to be a girlfriend? Has he been unwilling to commit to her and is he now expecting her to provide the level of support a married person would expect from their spouse?

 

[Bassethoundmama]

As someone on the Apple thread said, he is getting 4 or 5 MRIs this week, CT and PET scan, lumbar puncture then gamma knife radiation April 8th. He mentioned meeting with his team who is confident in the gamma knife radiation. I'm very curious if he's aware of the timeline or if his team has not discussed it with him? Perhaps he isn't "hearing" what they're telling him? Or maybe he's just trying to be as positive as possible. Also he spoke of his major "issues" are neurological - if he's aware of this I just don't understand why he's driving? It wasn't a "quick trip down the block " he was driving for over 20 mins.

 

[TryingMyBest]

Yeah the stereotype of Asian women is that they are very deferential to men. However, one of my friends is a Korean. Her parents moved to the US when she was 3. Initially they lived in neighborhoods with other Korean immigrants. But they pushed their 2 daughters to do well in school and go to Ivy League colleges. My friend did that, then went to a state law school and is now a partner in her law firm.

So she is a professional women who makes a lot of money, and has a husband and 2 kids. She does not defer to men.

Totally off topic but last night I watched the Netflix doco What Jennifer Did. Interesting look into her culture.

 

[mayday mayday]

He lives in a two-income household, is able to afford to drive a Subaru, but didn't bother to spend the money to obtain health insurance as expected of a
responsible adult. I wonder if the nurse girlfriend ever had a serious chat with him about the consequences of being uninsured.

 

[TryingMyBest]

This was Jenny's treatment. Hope it helps.
View attachment 2890228

Thanks. Poor Jenny. They tried so hard.

 

[riley123]

I forgot to add that he said he has 8 spots in his brain. I don’t remember if he said that before.

 

[AlwaysScience]

Thank you so much for creating this new thread!

More than once I've seen people commenting about him driving after suffering a seizure recently. Not only is he driving, but he filmed his entire 22 min video while behind the wheel. But hey, his doctor's say he can drive....so what do I know?

Yeah medical doctors are VERY conservative in situations like this because they fear getting sued if they tell someone they can do something,the patient does it, and there are bad consequences. I haven’t seen anything else that would indicate that he is a liar so I don’t know what to think about this.
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Does anyone know where Chris Sturm’s family members live? I don’t remember him saying anything in any of his videos. If they live in Wisconsin then it makes no sense for him to try to move to Los Angeles given the poor survival numbers.

I looked for survival information online for people with non small cell lung cancer with mets to the brain and it looks like he isn’t likely to live more than a year. I wonder if his oncologist has told him how poor survival is with brain mets. TiffanyThinks gave the impression that she didn’t know the survival statistics for her colorectal cancer and didn’t want to know.

But I wonder if most oncologists feel obligated to give patients some idea of the numbers so their patients can plan appropriately.

 

[Bassethoundmama]

I'm going to be very blunt - Chris is not a likeable guy to me. He seems arrogant, he jumped on the GFM gravy train, got $57k towards treatment and now wants privacy? I would never publicly beg for $, announce my cancer diagnosis, etc. Kudos to him for wanting to take his cancer journey private. But is he? He'll continue to vlog for people to pay to watch on patreon i wish him the best but I wouldn't continue to watch him on you tube let alone subscribe to his patreon

 

[riley123]

Justin Lee has been sending them information and photos of places to rent. There was no mention of living with his father. I don't think his father lives in Los Angeles.
After posting some of the antivax comments on IG stories, he did say it didn't bother him much because it drives traffic to his YT so he makes more money.
It sounds to me that he isn't expecting many too side effects from his upcoming treatments so they are hoping it's up and running by Dec.

As a homeowner my property taxes in Hawaii are quite low for the value of the home. One of the reasons is because our property taxes don't fund schools. The state legislature funds the DOE from state taxes.

 

[AlwaysScience]

Please tell me this isn't more stupid bullshit about the Covid vaccine.

I think it is about the vaccine. I’m seeing a number of comments on YouTube videos claiming people have cancer because they got COVID vaccines. Anti vaxxers are not intelligent people - thats clear to me from their comments and from knowing one personally. It used to be that when people did not understand a science topic they at least knew they were not qualified to have an opinion and would trust the things 5at the majority of medical doctors and scientists say about the subject.

Now there are people with no science education after high school going online to say COVID vaccines are gene therapy, that the risks outweigh the benefits, that they cause “turbo cancer” etc. These same people would never try to fix their own car because they know they don’t know how to do it. But they think they know better than doctors and scientists.

 

[AlwaysScience]

I just saw Chris' instagram stories and in one still photo, he was wearing that molded brace on his face, that they make for people who are undergoing gamma knife radiotherapy to their brain when they have mets. Is there another possible reason for it?

I don’t know if it was in one of his videos or in the notes on his GoFundMe, but Chris has said he will get gamma knife radiotherapy on his brain mets. It makes sense that that would be one of his earliest treatments to prevent or at least slow the worsening of brain damage.

 

[Bassethoundmama]

I noticed he updated the goal of his GFM again. Now at $100,000. I truly don't think he even realizes the debilitating cost yet. But I agree - I hope he is transparent with the costs so maybe people will see what having cancer in America (can) cost you.

 

[AlwaysScience]

I think Christopher Sturm has more intelligent followers than TiffanyThinks. A number of them have expressed concern about him driving, and about him driving and recording video at the same time.

Also, one of them looked up survival statistics for people with non small cell lung cancer with EGFR mutation and commented about it, with a link. Chris Sturm hasn’t yet said anything about survival info for metastatic NSCLC in his YouTube videos other than a vague comment about feeling more optimistic after getting information on his gene mutation.

Can’t imagine one of the TiffanyThinks followers looking online at medical journal articles to see recent survival statistics for colorectal cancer.

Well, now that I think about it, I guess Tiffany might have had followers in the past who did bring up survival information, but she or someone in her family deleted those comments.

 

[Make sense of it!]

Passive aggressive, much.

 

[mayday mayday]

Ivory from Ivory's Diary was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer that had at least one of the EGFR mutations. She started the oral drug Tagrisso and her med onc told her that it would only work for about 19 months. Tagrisso stopped her metastatic tumors from growing and she had around two good years living with metastatic disease. Sure enough, the Tagrisso stopped working and from I remember nothing else worked after that. Then she was diagnosed with leptomeningeal mets and she rapidly declined and went into hospice care. Her channel was very informative, she clearly explained her diagnosis and the impact of the EGFR mutation(s), I think she had one of the rarer mutations. From the start she knew she had a terminal illness and lived as best she could. Overall the EGFR lung cancers have a lousy prognosis but the anti-EGFR treatments are allowing patients to live longer and often without debilitating side effects.
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He posted a medical bill from the ER visit. $19,000. Why should he expect friends and strangers to pay his bill when he made the choice to not carry any medical insurance?

I can't watch him ... has he said why he doesn't qualify for Medicaid???!! The only reason would be that his income is too high to qualify. The hospital has financial staff that would assist him in obtaining Medicaid coverage. This process would have started at his very first hospital encounter. And I agree ... it was his choice not to carry insurance (wonder what the nurse GF thought about that) yet he expects a free ride.

 

[Bassethoundmama]

I don't think this would not be the first time she moved cross country with him it seems. I don't think I'll be continuing to watch his journey, I wish him well but I think he comes across as an arrogant ass.

 

[Bassethoundmama]

Yes! I agree. He claims to want to be, "humble and transparent" but he comes across arrogant and self promoting. As far as him driving, I see that as selfish. Yes our ability to drive gives us independence but my God. Imagine if he had a seizure? He could kill someone simply because he drove. I would never wish his diagnosis on anyone but I find it hard to "like" him.