THE FIRST TIME HE HAD CANCER, John Hemmingsen didn’t find out about it until it was almost too late.
It was back in 2006, and he began to notice that he felt winded after climbing stairs. He was in his mid-60s but in good shape, thanks to all the walking he did in his job as vice-president of foundry operations for a global steel company. It took his doctors seven years to sleuth out the source of his trouble: He was diagnosed with autoimmune hemolytic anemia, a precursor to acute myeloid leukemia. This blood cancer is so serious and its treatment so intense that the five-year survival rate is only 26 percent (and that drops to 11 percent in people
