A 56-year-old man, who first noticed something weird rubbing against his tongue, initially ignored it, thinking it was just a boil. However, despite some time passing, it did not go away, and neither was it painful. Still, Keith Giffney decided to get it checked and got the shock of his life.

Keith was diagnosed with fourth-stage head and neck cancer, which had spread to his lymph nodes, neck, and upper chest. While it is a diagnosis that would make many people feel anxious, distressed, or despondent, but not Giffney. He began his treatment under the supervision of his doctor, and while undergoing chemo and radiation therapy, within three months, he participated in a Half Ironman challenge. “I had this weird peacefulness about me,” he told The Post. When I was diagnosed, I just felt like, you know what, I got this; God’s got this. I’m going to fight this,” Giffney added.

Giffney says even before his diagnosis, he had decided to do the Half Ironman – a triathlon that consists of a 1.2-mile swim, a 56-mile bike ride, and a 13.1-mile run – and thought he would not let a “little thing” like cancer get in his way.

Giffney – a habitual tobacco user – said his first step was to quit it – even though the doctors told him his cancer was related to the HPV virus and not tobacco. “The funny thing was – January 2023 – my New Year’s resolution was to quit,” he said. “Well, I think I waited 360 days into that year to finally quit.” Four years sober, Giffney is no stranger to squashing vices, admitting that he was once addicted to alcohol, which strained his relationship with his son.

And since chemotherapy did not hit him hard, Giffney was able to complete the Half-Ironman challenge as well. “I could just tell that I was struggling initially after the chemo to maintain a certain level of speed — I was losing some of the strength in my legs,” he said. “But I gained it back when I got done with chemo,” he said.

The radiation, however, was a different story. “I lost all the taste buds; I couldn’t swallow. I also couldn’t eat anything in the last few weeks of radiation — that was the worst,” he said. Even then, he managed to put a positive spin on things.

According to experts, head and neck cancers are a group of malignancies that develop in the head and neck region, including the mouth, throat, nose, and sinuses. The most common type is squamous cell carcinoma, which originates in the flat cells lining the tissues of the mouth, throat, and voice box.

Other cancers can also occur in the salivary glands, sinuses, or muscles or nerves in the head and neck.

Cleveland Clinic says around 4.5 per cent of cancer diagnoses across the world are head and neck cancers. Most of these affect men over the age of 50. But this may be because this group are more likely to have risk factors associated with these cancers, like the history of tobacco use. In the US, instances of tobacco-related head and neck cancers have fallen, but the head and neck cancers related to HPV, a kind of sexually transmitted infection, are on the rise.

According to experts, the symptoms of head and neck cancer are often mild and can mimic less serious conditions like a cold or sore throat. The most common symptom is a sore throat that does not get better over time. Depending on the type of head and neck cancer, you may experience: