In April of 2013, Deborah was a busy mother of two young boys living in Brooklyn when a spot on her back came back positive for malignant melanoma. A sentinel lymph node biopsy was clear, but the pathology noted "melanoma in transit" — malignant cells already on their way to other parts of her body.

By September of 2014, the "bad stuff" had landed in her lungs. Her oncologist recommended a clinical trial combining a short course of radiation with a novel immunotherapy drug named Ipilimumab (Yer

When we are thrown into a health crisis, our brains desperately search for certainty through anchors, maps, timelines, and data. In the United States, the absolute gold standard for tracking population-level oncology data is a public health system called SEER (Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results) managed by the National Cancer Institute.




In this episode of The Epi Edit, cancer epidemiologist Dr. Randi Paynter pulls back the curtain on how SEER works under the hood, analyzing its 50

When we talk about cancer, we often talk about it in isolation — as a private medical crisis. But cancer doesn't happen in a vacuum. It happens to people who live in specific communities, navigate specific systems, and face distinct structural realities.




In this inaugural episode of The Epi Edit, host Dr. Randi Paynter steps behind the mic for a solo session to outline the mission of this new format and dismantle a deeply flawed framework that has dominated public health for decades: the p

Aiona came to California from Tonga when she was about a year old. She grew up in Sacramento, went on an LDS mission at twenty-one, came home, fell in love on what was essentially a second date, and eventually landed in Petaluma, CA — managing a Hampton Inn, raising two daughters, and working twelve-hour days until the day she noticed something had changed in her breast.

That was November 2025. The biopsy confirmed it: Stage III, hormone receptor-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer — eleven c

"The anxiety comes with the not knowing... When you know the end of the story, maybe that's when the anxiety goes away. I don't have as much anymore... I've jumped over every single hurdle. The last one is maybe going to be the hardest. But I'll do it and I'll finish the race." — Brenda




The medical framework treats the conclusion of active oncology protocols—the chemo infusions, the surgical steps, the daily radiation runs—as a clean finish line. But for the patient, it is simply the start

There is a version of this podcast that Dr. Randi Paynter imagined making before she started. She would sit across from strangers, ask them to trust her with the hardest thing that ever happened to them, and there would be a clean line between host and guest.

This is not that episode.

Brenda is Randi's sister. She is 52 years old. She works in human services — a career built on trying to do right by people the system overlooks. She has a dog named Lucy. She has metastatic breast cancer. And sh

Rachel is a two-time ovarian cancer survivor, an 18-year veteran of the cancer journey, and the author of The No-Bull**** Guide to Dealing with Cancer (written with co-author Dr. Mercedes Castiel). She was 32 years old when persistent, progressing symptoms led her to an OB-GYN, an ultrasound, a CAT scan, and — three days after her first appointment at Memorial Sloan Kettering — surgery for a rare form of ovarian cancer. She went into remission, had a recurrence in 2017, and is back in remission

Sasha's cancer was never supposed to be found when it was.


Invasive lobular carcinoma — the second most common form of breast cancer — grows not in a lump, but in sheets and lines of cells. It only shows up on mammograms about thirty percent of the time. Sasha's first mammogram had come back clear. It was a chance ultrasound, performed alongside an unrelated finding, that caught a shadow no one was looking for. A needle core biopsy confirmed it: invasive lobular carcinoma, grade one.


Then

Renee was 50 when her first mammogram came back with a diagnosis: ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS). She had a lumpectomy, radiation, and got on with her life. Two years later, the DCIS was back -- same breast, more aggressive, with a feature called comedonecrosis that changed the calculus entirely.


This time, Renee came to her surgeon armed. Two years of research, Facebook groups, Reddit threads, and hard questions had prepared her to advocate for exactly what she wanted: a double mastectomy w

Podcast episodes are coming soon!