A Mom of Five With Stage 4 Lung Cancer Now Waits for Donor Lungs in a Chicago ICU

From Half-Marathon Finish Lines to a Chicago ICU

One year ago, Kelsey Flake was running a half marathon. Now, she cannot walk across a room without oxygen. The 39-year-old Utah mother of five has never smoked a day in her life, yet she finds herself at the center of one of the most extraordinary medical stories in the country — lying in a Chicago ICU, one lung removed, waiting for a donor to give her a second chance at life.

Flake was diagnosed with a rare form of lung cancer in 2024. After undergoing chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and surgery, her cancer returned in both lungs in January, and progressed to Stage 4. She now has only 41% lung capacity and relies on oxygen full-time. Flake was born with a rare genetic variant that her family says predisposes her to lung damage and lung cancer, and four of her six siblings also carry the variant.

A Surgery Like No Other

On Thursday, August 21, Flake underwent surgery to have her right lung removed. She is now on a transplant list and will remain in a medically-induced coma until a donor match becomes available. Her husband Jacob said the surgery went according to plan, and that the average wait time for donor lungs is two to four days. In the meantime, Kelsey remains on a heart-lung machine in the ICU under constant supervision.

Jacob described the transplant option as something that once seemed like "an impossibility" when they first began fighting the cancer with chemotherapy. But as treatments ran out, it became the last real option — through the DREAM program at Northwestern Medicine. The DREAM program — Double Lung Replacement and Multidisciplinary Care — is a first-of-its-kind clinical program at Northwestern Medicine offering double-lung transplantation to select patients with Stage 4 lung cancers confined to the lungs. The program is intended for patients whose lung cancer is not responding to treatment and who have no other treatment options.

Groundbreaking Science Behind a Desperate Gamble

Historically, patients with cancer have not been able to get lung transplants — and Northwestern Medicine is working to change that. The results so far are striking. A Northwestern Medicine study published on July 8 in JAMA examined 98 patients with Stage 4 non-small cell lung cancer. Seventeen received lung transplants, while 81 who were medically eligible but faced nonbiological barriers continued with standard medical treatment. Researchers reported an estimated one-year overall survival rate of 100% among the transplant recipients, compared with just 40.8% among those who received medical management alone.

One of the biggest concerns with performing a transplant on a cancer patient is the risk of recurrence after surgery, since all transplant patients require immune-suppressing medications — and a suppressed immune system can allow lingering cancer cells to rapidly flare up. It is a calculated risk, but for patients like Kelsey Flake, it is the only risk left worth taking.

A Family Separated, A Community United

Once her transplant is complete, Kelsey will remain in Chicago for a full year of recovery, with Jacob by her side — while their five children remain in Utah until at least the end of 2026. "That's going to be a pretty big challenge for our family, but fortunately we have amazing family and friends that are taking care of them," Jacob said. Both Kelsey and Jacob are self-employed in real estate, so their ability to work and earn income will be significantly reduced during this time, while also taking on the enormous cost of temporarily relocating a family of seven.

Kelsey Flake's story is more than a medical milestone — it is a reminder that lung cancer does not discriminate. "What they like to say in the cancer community is anybody who has lungs can get lung cancer," Jacob said. As she waits in a Chicago ICU for a call that could come within hours or days, an entire community — and a medical field — waits alongside her, hoping that the science catches up to the urgency of one mother's fight to come home.