Kenechi Udeze has leukemia

[BamaFalcon59]

Best of luck to him and his friends and family. Hopefully it is not the severe kind.

[energizerbunny]

depending on the type it could not be serious at all..... Jason Blake of the Toronto Maple Leafs currently is playing while receiving treatment for leukemia

[TitanHope]

As a cancer survivor, my thoughts and prayers go out to Kenechi and his family.

First off, ALL cancer is serious. You can be diagnosed with a type of cancer with a high cure rate, and then relapse. Your cancer can mestasize to other parts of your body. It doesn't really matter what he has. Just because the treatment isn't causing you to be inpatient in a hospital doesn't diminish the disease's severity. One would hope this never happens to Kenechi or Jason Blake, but just because Blake plays hockey doesn't mean something else can't happen. In my personal experience, the chances of relapsing after leukemia is higher than that of a solid tumor.

As far as leukemia goes, it depends on the type and how early it was caught. If it was caught early, which I assume it was as he and the Vikings' med staff would have likely seen the signs of a problem with Udeze's health during the season, then I expect that he should make a full recovery. The typical treatment plan for leukemia, or at least the type my friends had, is 3-years of chemotherapy. For those who don't know, leukemia is cancer in the blood stream; It's not specifically in one part of the body. If he had a solid tumor, which is what I had (Ewing's Sarcoma/Bone Cancer), then the chemo treatment would be shorter (Mine was 8-months) and he'd have radiation treatment and surgery to remove the tumor. So since the cancer is so spread out, the treatment must be longer so the chances of killing it are better. Though, the dose and severity of the chemotherapy for leumekia patients is less severe than tumor patients.

On the bright side, Kenechi should be able to return to football after his treatment, or possibly even during it. Unless there's a mass somewhere in his body, he won't have to have any surgery that would affect his physical capabilities. And, his chemo's dose should be low enough that his body shouldn't be damaged in the long run, such as organ problems or premature osteoperosis/arthritis (Chemotherapy is essentially poison. It kills cells in your body, both malignant and benign. Thats why your hair falls out, etc.). But then again, if his leukemia is advanced or severe, then his treatment will match the severity.

Focusing on his health sounds like the best thing, but in reality, overcoming life-threatening disease is mostly mental. If you're sitting around waiting on something bad to happen to you, then the odds are that something bad indeed will happen to you. If you keep a positive mentality, then the treatment process will go more smoothly. And if staying close to football or even playing it makes Kenechi happy, then it's probably in his best interest to do so as long as he doesn't do anything to compromise his health.