'He's Really Lucky': New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy Returns To Work After Announcing He'll Undergo Surgery For Kidney Tumor

TRENTON, N.J. (CBS) -- New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy was back at work Monday after announcing over the weekend he'll undergo surgery for a kidney tumor. This appears to have been caught early and Murphy, who is expected to run for re-election next year, has a good prognosis.

He says his goal is to recover in time for a 5K run that's on his schedule in April.

The 62-year-old says he has a kidney tumor that's probably cancerous.

"Friends – I've got a tumor on my left kidney and will undergo a partial nephrectomy in early March to remove it. The prognosis is very good and I'm profoundly grateful to my doctors for detecting the tumor early," Murphy wrote in a tweet.

"He's really lucky and it sounds to me that it's a small mass," Dr. Naomi Haas, from Penn Medicine's Abramson Cancer Center, said.

Dr. Haas says like with Gov. Murphy, small kidney tumors are usually found during checkups for other things, like a colonoscopy.

"That is actually the most common way that kidney cancers are detected. They're very deep in the abdomen so ordinarily unless something gets really big or spreads somewhere, you don't normally detect this sort of thing," Dr. Haas said.

She says radiation or chemotherapy usually aren't needed after a small kidney tumor is removed, which can be done laparoscopically.

"Generally, the recovery is very quick. People often are back at work in four weeks," Dr. Haas said.

Testing on the tumor after it's removed is when the cancer is confirmed.

Murphy is expected to be hospitalized in New York City for two or three days after the surgery in March, then recover at home for a few weeks.

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