When Michael Leboeuf heard the news that he had stage 4 lung cancer, "You start thinking about dying. You start thinking, 'The party's over.'''

Leboeuf said, 'You feel helpless.''

A Thibodaux native, Leboeuf had smoked "for many many years." 

His doctor, Burke J. Brooks Jr., MD, of Ochsner Cancer Center - Baton Rouge, said that when he first met Leboeuf, "he was very sick.'' Through genetic testing, Brooks determined that a new treatment called immunotherapy could help Leboeuf.

"It's altering our own immune system to help fight cancers,'' Brooks said.

The treatment was used successfully in combination with chemotherapy and radiation. Leboeuf also went into a smoking cessation program.

Ochsner Cancer Center - Baton Rouge, a newly renovated building, is located in the Physicians Plaza II building near Ochsner Medical Center – Baton Rouge. With more than 20,000 square feet, it features state-of-the-art, innovative treatment options in cancer care, such as 15 personalized and semi-private chemo infusion stations. This is the only cancer program in the Baton Rouge to conveniently offer a hematology and oncology outpatient health center with both chemotherapy infusion and radiation oncology services on one floor, in the same building.

Learn more about Ochsner Cancer Center in Baton Rouge.