The knock that changed everything: Mike’s journey through cancer care at WRHN
Patient Story
Mike Morrice was tired. He was losing weight. His body was aching.
But in the midst of an exhausting 2019 federal election campaign as Kitchener Centre’s Green Party candidate, he dismissed his symptoms as part of the daily grind that comes with political aspirations.
Had it not been for a knock on a neighbour’s door, he may have ignored the signs completely.
“I was canvassing for the campaign and at one house, I met a voter who told me about their cancer journey,” Mike says.
I was empathizing with them, but in my own head I’m thinking: ‘Oh my God, what if I have cancer?’
The encounter prompted Mike to get his symptoms checked out. Little did he know, he was about to begin a transformative period that would span the next five years.
From doorsteps to diagnosis
Without a family doctor, Mike visited a walk-in clinic where a physician ordered an ultrasound. Results arrived the next day.
“‘I think this is testicular cancer,’” Mike recalls the doctor saying. “That was a pit-in-my-stomach moment.”
Mike, then 35, thought about his life, his health and his political goals. He was building momentum in the campaign and didn’t want to stop.
A urologist at Waterloo Regional Health Network @ Queens Blvd., outlined his treatment options.
The cancer was in the early stages and not likely to advance quickly, he told Mike. While immediate surgery to remove the testicle was recommended, he also gave Mike the option to wait and finish the campaign.
“That conversation meant so much to me,” Mike says. “He gave me the language I needed to talk to my family about my decision.”
Had he said: ‘You must have this surgery right now,’ I would have had an existential crisis. But he understood the context of what was going on in my life.
Mike had surgery a week after his second-place finish in the election.
Low point, high point
In the years following his surgery, Mike had regular appointments at WRHN @ Midtown to monitor his condition with blood work and imaging scans – visits that continued through his victorious 2021 election campaign and throughout the pandemic.
Then, in October 2024, Mike received encouraging news: he’d gone five years since his surgery and the cancer had not returned. He was no longer at high risk of reocurrence. He visited the WRHN Cancer Centre again last month for another successful checkup.
Mike, who lost his Parliament seat in the 2025 election, remains grateful for the care he received – and continues to receive – at WRHN.
And he appreciates the generosity of those who helped fund the equipment and programs that our community relies on each day.
"I was lucky enough to have access to the care I needed because enough people stepped up to fill the cracks in our healthcare system,” Mike says
People shouldn’t have to leave their community to access quality healthcare.
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