Biographer: Jobs refused early and potentially life-saving surgery

(CBS News) 

Apple CEO Steve Jobs refused to allow surgeons to perform what could have been life-saving surgery on his pancreatic cancer, says his biographer Walter Isaacson. In one of his deepest discussions with him, Isaacson says Jobs told him he regretted his decision to try alternative therapies and said he put off the operation because it was too invasive.

Complete coverage: Steve Jobs: 1955-2011

Isaacson reveals these and many other inner thoughts of the man who entrusted him with the writing of his life story in the upcoming book, "Steve Jobs." The author talks to Steve Kroft in his first interview about Jobs, the late technology visionary whose innovative products like the Macintosh, iPhone and iPad changed the world. The interview will be broadcast on "60 Minutes," Sunday, Oct. 23 at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

"I've asked [Jobs why he didn't get an operation then] and he said, 'I didn't want my body to be opened...I didn't want to be violated in that way,'" Isaacson recalls. So he waited nine months, while his wife and others urged him to do it, before getting the operation, reveals Isaacson. Asked by Kroft how such an intelligent man could make such a seemingly stupid decision, Isaacson replies, "I think that he kind of felt that if you ignore something, if you don't want something to exist, you can have magical thinking...we talked about this a lot," he tells Kroft. "He wanted to talk about it, how he regretted it....I think he felt he should have been operated on sooner."

He finally had the surgery and told his employees about it, but played down the seriousness of his condition. Isaacson says he was receiving cancer treatments in secret even though he was telling everyone he was cured.

Isaacson conducted over 40 interviews with Jobs, some of them taped right before his death. The story Sunday will contain Jobs' own recorded words about some of the most important times of his life.

Isaacson reveals several of the best stories from the biography, including the fact that Jobs had actually met the man who turned out to be his biological father before he knew who he was. He also talks about the discussion he had with Jobs about death and the afterlife, explaining that for Jobs, the odds of there being a God were 50-50, but that he thought about the existence of God much more once he was diagnosed with cancer. Another aspect of Jobs' character revealed was his disdain for conspicuous consumption. He tells Isaacson in a taped conversation how he saw Apple staffers turn into "bizarro people" by the riches the Apple stock offering created. Isaacson says Jobs vowed never to let his wealth change him.

Disclosure: Walter Isaacson's biography "Steve Jobs" is published by Simon & Schuster, a division of CBS corporation.

[P-NET]

A PNET pancreas neuroendocrine tumor is a rare slow growing type of cancer, usually associated with just one tumor mass. PNET is diagnosed to only about 2,500 Americans annually, so compared to other types of cancers, there isn't as much research or data available. Depending on the location and if a resection is possible, the tumor can be removed by surgery, but sometimes a complicated Whipple surgery is required. Radiation and chemotherapy treatments are now successful tools to help shrink these tumors, but surgery is thought to work best. Choosing the best type of treatment will always be a difficult choice to make, and there is no guarantee that the best medical choices won't result in a remission of the cancer. While Job's may have originally sought non-traditional treatments, it has been reported that he later became very involved in research and was one of the few people in the world to have his DNA sequenced. Don't be surprised if Job's personal research results in medical advances and cures in the future.

[voxpopulus]

Almost everything Apple makes is about conspicuous consumption. And I say this even though I have plenty of Apple toys myself.

[formerusmcsgt1]

While Jobs was a genius in some aspects, he was an idiot in others.

So he made $6B. Big deal. I bet he would have traded it all for another year.

[Armed_Texan]

Beggars on foot,
Princes and Kings who ride,
In skull and bone land,
saunter side by side

-EUALITY

[drivertwo200]

Surgery was too invasive ? How foolish can such a wizard be.

[Snofyre]

My regrets to his family and friends.........he does not hurt anymore.
.....Chathie

[Candide8]

The EGO giveth and the EGO taketh away...

[Puddleoffudd]

Amen and Amen!

[Jim_Thorp]

It's unlikely that a few months made a difference.

Please remember Jobs was already having intestinal issues so severe that he had to undergo several abdominal scans.

Even though it is not as quick as 'regular' pancreatic cancer, this type of tumor often has already thrown metastases by the time it is found.

Which is why Jobs needed a new liver, even after the tumor was resected.

With this type of cancer, most people get 5-6 years, but Jobs he got 8, so he was well past expected mean survival.

[swimsea]

Thank you Jim...for pointing out that Steve Jobs lived much longer than the great majority of pancreatic cancer patients ..the ones who opt for the traditional medical approach.

[Puddleoffudd]

What was missed was that Jobs jumped the pancreas transplant line in Tennessee by tossing loads of cash at the medical center.

Jobs lived longer by killing someone else. He was an egotistical anus.

Sorry that your Messiah was nothing of the sort.

[tmittelstaed]

I have had cancer that by the time it was caught had fully metastized. I was given a 5% chance of survival (most of the doctors told my family I was going to die) Yet I survived and am cancer free today. What was my cure? It was quite simple. Here is what I did:

1) Talked to many people and got referrals to a very respected oncologist.

2) Did exactly as my doctor told me to do.

3) Dropped everything in my life as soon as I was diagnosed. I got my ultrasound on Friday of the tumor and by Wednesday was in a hospital bed, getting chemo, out from my job on disability, vehicles in storage, had friends handling my apartment and paying the utility bills, etc.

4) Let everyone know at my workplace, family, etc. exactly what I was sick from and asked them to come visit. A great many prayed for me, although I am not really a believer in the so-called power of prayer.

5) Got a lot of help from my SO (I later married her) who had me stay in her apartment between chemo runs so she could watch me.

6) Never once believed for a second that I was going to die.

My $0.02 is that Jobs killed himself. He refused help, hid the cancer, and continued working. So, during the time he was fighting this he was carrying all of the emotional burden on himself. Jobs worked at a company where practically all of the employees worshipped the ground he walked on. He should have turned his back on his work and his responsibilities at Apple, let everyone know what was going on, and stayed home and concentrated on fighting his cancer and getting better. He should have spent his time with his family and friends, forgiven his biological father and reconciled with him, and let go of his personal burdens. His employees would have sent him a deluge of cards, texts, and well-wishes.

In short, with this serious of a cancer the only way to win against it is to fight, and unless your willing to drop everything in your life your not really fighting. Everything in your life needs to revolve around the cancer yet at the same time you cannot feel that the cancer controls you and you simply cannot do that unless you voluntariarly choose to make your life, the center of your life.

Jobs was never a fighter. His MO has been when things got tough to cut and run. It is a MO that has served him well in business because in all of the times that he has cut and run, he has ended up better off. But it isn't an MO that works with cancer.

[harlan02]

Other than 6) your words are great advice. Unfortunately people opt for "alternate" methods without ever dealing with your point 6). If people reject their doctor's advise and go alternative, then they should be at peace with their coming death: finish well.

[clearyatoff-the-cliff]

This is such a tragedy, and it should be an object lesson to those who think that there is a tooth fairy or Santa Claus, or a free lunch, or any other kind of "magic thinking." There is only structure: multiple causes and multiple effects. And it shows that extremely intelligent people are nonetheless human, and have all the frailties like blind spots, false notions, wrong allegiances, etc. Jobs was apparently a victim of his own success and came to believe he could think his way out of any difficulty, even when that difficulty was not susceptible to thought without medical aid. I have seen many relatives and friends struck by maladies like heart attack, stroke, cancer, diabetes, etc. I have not once seen an "alternative therapy" do squat. Not once. On the other hand, I've seen friends and family members come out of hospitals to live on for years after their incidents. Does this mean I have a handle on "the truth?" A pipeline to God? No. But it is my experience. Take it for what it's worth.

[kmfitz3]

Well, here's an example for you--I refused surgery for a large basal cell carcinoma and cured it on my own through dietary changes. It took three or four years of experimenting with different changes, but it cleared up completely ten years ago and hasn't returned. I guess Steve Kroft would think I was stupid, but I just realized that modern medicine is still in the dark about the healing power of the human body. And I'll bet Jobs did too--after all he lived his life according to "think different." That's why he did such amazing things. Maybe if he didn't listen to the chorus of people telling him to get surgery, he might've forged a new path for medicine as well. So have a little humility, Mr. Kroft. Don't forget, there was a time when doctors were bloodletting and performing unnecessarily radical mastectomies that left women crippled.