Dag Kittlaus “who sold his famous speech recognition company to Apple in 2010, was dubious about getting an executive exam at the University of Colorado hospital,” Kara Swisher reports for Recode. “He was in great shape, having done regular triathlons and always eating healthy. But his wife had urged him to go and so he did in November.”
“While getting a scan of his heart, though, the doctors inadvertently discovered a lemon-sized tumor on his pancreas, ironically of the exact same rare type that Apple founder Steve Jobs had,” Swisher reports. “Called pancreatic neuroendocrine cancer, it is luckily one of the less aggressive kinds of tumors, but only if caught early. Often, it is not, since there are no real symptoms until the person who has one gets jaundice, after which it can be too late.”
“Kittlaus had surgery at Johns Hopkins that took half his pancreas, as well as his spleen and gall bladder, and where one of the nurses was, ironically, named Siri,” Swisher reports. “‘It was the luckiest set of circumstances, because without that exam it most certainly would have spread and I would be dead,’ said Kittlaus in an interview this week. ‘The prognosis is very good and I am incredibly lucky, but the biggest thing I learned is that tomorrow is promised to no one.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Good to see he took expedient action on this lucky gift of foresight. Would that Steve had done so, too.
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