By Kay Quinn, KSDK-TV, February 23, 2007

There is encouraging news in the search for better treatments for pancreatic cancer.

Gary Hackstadt has lived an amazing four years after his diagnosis and doctors hope to learn from him. The majority of patients diagnosed with the traditional form of pancreatic cancer live less than a year.

An operation and a new regimen of drug and radiation therapy is helping patients Hackstadt live longer, productive lives.

"I just want to be able to see my grandkids and stuff like that," said Hackstadt.

Hackstadt welcomed the births of four grandchildren since the diagnosis of his pancreatic cancer in January 2003. He''s also never stopped working full time as a truck driver delivering agricultural products all over southern Illinois.

"I really didn''t have time to think. You never think it''s going to happen to you but it does and you just got to deal with it," said Hackstadt.

Five-year survival rates are still low - 15 to 25 percent for people whose cancer has spread outside the pancreas.

But patients like Hackstadt, whose cancer is found early, are candidates for aggressive treatment.

"Where we used to see 10 percent survival we''re now seeing 50 percent survival," said Dr. William Hawkins, a pancreatic cancer specialist at the Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine.

Hawkins said a combination of drugs, radiation therapy and immune-modulating drugs are boosting quality and quantity of life.

So is an operation called the Whipple procedure. During the procedure, surgeons remove the pancreas and part of the stomach and intestines.

"We''re very good at removing 99.9 percent of the cancer and the thing that defeats us is the 1 percent of the cancer that''s left behind that we don''t know where it is in the body," said Dr. Steven Strasberg, a liver and pancreas surgeon at Siteman Cancer Center.

But Strasberg believes a targeted form of therapy like the kind used in breast cancer will soon boost survival rates even higher.

Both Hawkins and Strasberg are also studying patients like Hackstadt for genetic differences that may contribute to survival.

Hackstadt''s overcome the return of his cancer twice in the liver over the past four years. He credits a positive attitude, family support and good medical care.