Banking on KC – Steve Hentzen of The Prostate Network
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Kelly Scanlon:
Welcome to Banking on KC. I'm your host, Kelly Scanlon. Thank you for joining us. With us on this episode is Steve Hentzen, the co-founder and president of the Prostate Network. Welcome, Steve.
Steve Hentzen:
Thank you so much for having me.
Kelly Scanlon:
What inspired you to found this organization?
Steve Hentzen:
I, about 15 years ago, age 46, got this horrible diagnosis. I was trying to go to Boy Scout camp to Bartle Scout Reservation with my son to see the whole thing. I had helped him raise money selling Christmas trees. And in order to get in as an adult or to get in, not just on family day, you had to have a medical form signed. And it was because of that medical form, my doctor wouldn't sign it like the third time because I hadn't gone in.
And when I went in, he did his thing, he said, "Have a good time at camp." And he called me on a Saturday and said, "Well, no, we got to talk." So I got diagnosed. And then he started this journey and I met this other guy, had nothing in common with except our diagnosis. His name is Cesar. We both thought we were gone and we just pleaded this can't be it. We both had sons. We had things left to do here. Well, about a year into it, we were talking and we were like, "Okay, so what are we going to do now?" And that's how the Prostate Network was born.
Kelly Scanlon:
So out of your own personal experiences and a need to give back to others who'd been through a similar experience?
Steve Hentzen:
We thought we were the only ones.
Kelly Scanlon:
Oh.
Steve Hentzen:
We still almost. Because there was no resources. There was nothing. And we had nowhere to go. We had our medical stuff, but we didn't have a way to connect with each other. And so we started making it up. We were like, "Okay, so what are we going to do? How are we going to find them?" And as soon as we started hanging up, our shingle came out of the woodwork.
Kelly Scanlon:
I bet.
Steve Hentzen:
Churches, all sorts of people in the community just started reaching out. Not a nonprofit, nothing, just two guys. And when we started doing it, we found a void.
Kelly Scanlon:
But it was word of mouth initially.
Steve Hentzen:
Oh, yeah. I mean...
Kelly Scanlon:
It was just people telling other people.
Steve Hentzen:
Yeah.
Kelly Scanlon:
So here you are... How many years later at this point?
Steve Hentzen:
About 15.
Kelly Scanlon:
About 15 years later here you are. What is it that you do? I mean you share resources, camaraderie, support. Tell me about that.
Steve Hentzen:
So we've done a lot of things over the years, but our main thing is we've created a safe space for men that are dealing with this or their whole families in some cases. Sometimes the wives are more likely to come than the guys, believe it or not. Their sons. Their sons are struggling because you get this diagnosis. It's not just affecting the one person, it affects the whole family. And so we've created the safe space. We are very consistent. That was one thing Cesar was like on, we do it on the same day. And so it's been the first Wednesday of the month, 6:30 PM, we don't miss.
Kelly Scanlon:
They're meetings? They're meetings?
Steve Hentzen:
Yeah, we network. Support is a word that men don't want to need. They don't want us weak. So we network.
Kelly Scanlon:
You network, okay.
Steve Hentzen:
And we created the safe space. And so when you go to your doctor because you're going to talk about doctor stuff, and we may kind of talk about some of that, but we're talking people that have the issue, talking to other people that have the issue. That is something that they need.
Kelly Scanlon:
They need to know that they're not alone and that there's other people going through the same thing. What did you do? How did you cope with that kind of thing?
Steve Hentzen:
I found Cesar and he found me. So we were like, "Okay, what can we do?" So we basically have created an environment where others that want to do that could come do that. And so some of them come once or twice and get what they need and move on. Others stick around for years and we've created all sorts of things for them to do. And so our main thing is that, but yet we'll do all sorts of other stuff.
Kelly Scanlon:
Well, for example, I've seen your Facebook page. You provide resources and so forth.
Steve Hentzen:
That's where people can come. Because this is one of those reluctant things. It's a very unique subject.
Kelly Scanlon:
It is.
Steve Hentzen:
Because men don't want to talk about it.
Kelly Scanlon:
Well, and that's one of the things I was going to ask you about. It can be a very difficult topic. So what are some of the challenges that you have faced as you encourage these participants on Wednesday evenings about how to open up and have these discussions and create that comfortable, safe culture that you just described?
Steve Hentzen:
The challenges are really hard to pin down. Some people want to track it and people want to know numbers. How many people are you this or that? I don't care. We have a meeting and we help one guy. It was worth having it. So it is a challenge to get men to want to do this. Oh my goodness. Yes. But we're on a podcast and that was something we discovered as well. So we have our own podcast and what we discovered was we'd helped a survivor. We helped a guy that was into radio and he came to me like 10 years ago and asked me if we could put this stuff on podcast because we had speakers. And I said, "What are podcasts?" And so fast forward, we did.
We had a little bit of traction with our podcast originally. He worked so hard on them. His name is Buck. And Buck polished these podcasts up and we had so much fun doing it. But then when COVID hit, we couldn't have our meetings. Eventually we figured out how to get online, but in our podcast, downloads exploded. So people, they needed this. And so we've gotten creative over the years of creating ways to meet people where they're at. And so the meeting is the main thing, but if you've got a way for us to talk to guys, invite us. We'll come.
Kelly Scanlon:
Okay. And it's interesting to hear you say, and maybe 15 years ago it was much different, but statistics anyway, show that about one in eight men will eventually have or be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lifetimes. It's interesting that you are all dealing with it, not working, but dealing with this in isolation. What should our audience know about those statistics when you hear one in eight men? Should women be encouraging their husbands to get regular screenings? What is it about those statistics that's telling and how can early detection make an impact?
Steve Hentzen:
Oh, you've hit all my hot subjects. There's a lot of people in our world that are like, "Get screening, get screening, get screening." And there's a lot of organizations, "We have free screenings." And I love those. I'm for that. But that's really not my message when I get the chance to hear the guys are sitting in front of me. What I'm going to tell them is they need to take better care of their bodies than their new truck. They may get one or two, maybe three new trucks in their lifetime, but they're only going to get one body.
And what they have to do is they have to take care of it. They've got to eat good. They've got to exercise. And they have to go to the doctor, not when they're sick, not when their knee hurts. They've got to go get physicals. And they've got to be honest with their doctor and tell them what's going on. And they have to listen when their doctor says, "Hey, you're doing too much of this or you're not doing enough of that." They have to listen to them and they have to take good care of their bodies.
So the statistics are terrifying. And in fact, while the medicine and the cures keep getting better and better and better, which is wonderful, men are not doing what they need to do. If you look at the statistics on cancer deaths.
Kelly Scanlon:
All cancer deaths?
Steve Hentzen:
All. Yeah, women. You are doing so much better because you're taking advantage of modern medicine and you're getting all these things caught earlier because the early detection is the whole thing. Cancer with virtually anything medical, right? It's catch it early, you can fix things up. You wait till things fester, then they turn terrible. And so that's still happening with men. We haven't turned the corner yet. I think the number, somewhere around 33,500 men in the United States will die this year from prostate cancer. And virtually every one of them didn't have to.
So think about how many families are not going to have dad and grandpa this year. And if those guys were taking care of their bodies like they were their new truck, they'd be here longer. Say, well, not anybody is going to get the forever card. But this isn't the one you want to go by because it's so curable. So the treatments are not a hundred percent, but they're dang close to a hundred percent if they catch the stuff early.
And so if you've got a good doctor, and this is one of those things that you can catch, then it breaks my heart to see these guys come in with these late stage diagnoses and you're like, "How did it get caught?" And they're like, "Oh," and they have these stories about how they haven't gone to the doctor. We've had different success with screenings and stuff, and I can't talk about individuals, but I can tell you I have seen guy after guy come up in a badge of honor, "I hadn't met a doctor in 20 years." And I'm thinking, "Dude, do you not know that your family loves you?" If you love your family, you got to be there for them.
Kelly Scanlon:
That brings me to another question. It was a survivor-founded organization. It's still survivor-led, it sounds like. So what difference does that make, the fact that it is survivors talking to survivors or working with survivors that makes it more successful?
Steve Hentzen:
Well, I'm obviously a little biased, but I think we're the most genuine, heartfelt nonprofit in the history of earth. Cesar's heart was gold. We kept everything we did on mission. We weren't a lead thing. We weren't a real thing. It was finally about three or four years into doing this, I kind of flipped it out of pocket, we had our thing, that we wanted to get up on the stage at KC Live where there was doing a crawl for cancer thing. We wanted to talk to all these people. There's thousands of people. And we said, "Hey, can we do that?" And they said, "Yeah, fill this out. We'd more than happy to have you, like your logo on our shirts and have you come up and talk."
We had to be a nonprofit. And I was like, "Oh God, I don't know what that is. Hold on." Well, one of the guys that we had helped shared whatever reason. He shared what he did for a living. We don't ask people that, but his name is Charlie Bai.
Kelly Scanlon:
Oh yeah. He was a long-time Cancer Club Bank associate executive. Exactly.
Steve Hentzen:
And he came and he shared how-
Kelly Scanlon:
He's still on your board, right?
Steve Hentzen:
He is. We love Charlie. So Charlie helped us get this nonprofit started and we to this date have been a hundred percent volunteer. Every penny that we've ever raised, we just pour back into the community here. And because we've done it and kept it so heartfelt, everybody is on board. Everybody we talked to like, "How can we help?" And so that's what... Just we're going to keep it going. It was probably the hardest thing I ever had to deal with was losing my buddy Cesar. It was about four years ago now.
So it was still end of COVID and it was cancer, so it wasn't immediate thing. And he was so proud of everything we had done. He made me promise. He goes, "Because you're the young and healthy, you got this. You've got to keep it going." And so I promised. And so I'm going to keep my word. I think I've got another couple decades. I'm going the gym every day. I am eating healthy, and this is what I plan to do with the rest of my life is to keep this on mission.
Kelly Scanlon:
Aside from the Wednesday evening meetings that you talked about, and your podcasts, what are some of the other programs that you have that allow you to engage with survivors who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer?
Steve Hentzen:
So we get invited and we will go to anywhere, and I'll give you a few examples so people have some ideas on ways that we have been able to engage with the community to increase our impact. Example, insurance company, CEO reached out and had me hijack his staff meeting with all hands, like everybody at the insurance company. So I shared my messages. That is one way. We've had a no Shave November, somebody with a bar. A bunch of their friends had some hair salons and they came up with a no Shave November and we had a blast doing that.
Somebody that was doing health for a construction company, a large, large project. I can't say who it was, but they do a bend and stretch at like 6:00 AM once a week. We hijack the bend and stretch and talk to these guys. We've had game at the Royals. So it is a hard thing for some guys to do is to come to one of these meetings. So we try to meet them where they're at. So I think it'll be our seventh year we've done it. We don't do it every year, but we've been able to partner with the Royals and with KU to do the health day, the prostate day, out of the K.
So we're going to do that again this year. It'll be June 11th. We're going to take and beat the Yankees and beat prostate cancer. We've got these little business cards and people can request a kit, if you will. And so they want to put information on this, in their desk, wherever where they've got people coming through. We can supply that to them.
Kelly Scanlon:
So it's not just about encouraging these men to network, it's very much about that. But in addition to that, it is about creating awareness in general among the public so that as you say, men are more likely to go get their health checkups. And when you started out, you talked about how it affects everybody. It affects the entire family, it affects their friends. There's many people involved in one of these diagnoses. So how do you reach that extended circle?
Steve Hentzen:
You would think that the guys would sign right up, but they don't. They keep this stuff top secret. I know many of them have died without telling their mom. They don't tell their children. And when those people find out, they need our help, and so we talk to them. So the men are mostly what our meetings are, but everyone is welcome. One of the more creative things. So a gentleman, a friend of mine, he's challenged me to a race.
And so on May 3rd, we're going to hijack cars and coffee here in Kansas City and we're going to have a 50-yard dash and we're going to have prizes. It's the race to encourage men to get fit and get physicals. So we're creating spectacles whenever we can think of it. So that's one of my buddy's ideas.
Kelly Scanlon:
Is this going to be the two of you or is the general public invited to run too for this 50-
Steve Hentzen:
Well, no, it's just the two of us and you got to pick the winner and you got to pick the time.
Kelly Scanlon:
Okay. So there is-
Steve Hentzen:
And to get the prizes.
Kelly Scanlon:
So there is public involvement. Okay.
Steve Hentzen:
Yeah. I've been wanting to hijack a car show for a long time.
Kelly Scanlon:
It's hilarious.
Steve Hentzen:
So we got to go where they're at. That's the thing. Like the Royals game, right? We go where they're at because you go to the race, you go to the car shows, you go to the... Don't ever think that you're going to have an event about men's health. Everybody falls into the trap. "Oh, we're going to have an event about men's health." Nobody is going to show up. So we got to hijack other events.
Kelly Scanlon:
That is a great insight. There is a lot of information that's out there about cancer in general. I am sure in particular about prostate cancer. But in the age of the internet, most people will tell you there's a lot of misinformation too. So-
Steve Hentzen:
There's more misinformation than good information.
Kelly Scanlon:
I'm sure that's true. So how do you ensure that the men and their families are getting the accurate information?
Steve Hentzen:
That it on our end. We're not trying to be doctors. So we share information because there's a lot of interest in things. So we're very careful about anything on our website. But we tell people the leading place for great information is the Prostate Cancer Research Institute that if you want to get really good information, they really break it down. I think that's the best way is to just stick with a place, and that's the one we recommend.
Kelly Scanlon:
What is the latest information coming out about prostate cancer? You said that especially when it's caught early, that the news is getting better and better as far as survivorship rates. What else can you tell us about that?
Steve Hentzen:
I'm glad you asked that. So there's this thing called a biopsy, and basically the blood test identifies that maybe something is going on, but then they got to say, "Is it really something or is it not? Right? Is it cancer or is it not?" So they have to get a biopsy. So if you will picture what a random biopsy would be versus a guided one. So there's a thing called an MRI, and there's all sorts of techniques now to identify images of the human body to know where the interesting looking cells are.
So the prostate is an organ about half the size of a baseball maybe. And so you need to identify where those interesting cells are in there. And so it's painful. So with the location of it, they got to go in the hole. You don't want to go in to get to this thing. And so the random biopsies are done when guys are awake, and I think of it as cruel and unnecessary because they can have anesthesia and they can do these guided biopsies.
So if I can catch someone who has a PSA that's spooked them and they're like... Because when you first get any kind of diagnosis, that's usually when we hear from people. I'm like, "If I hear from them before they've gone through the biopsy," I'm like, "Get the good biopsy." And then in addition to having a good biopsy, you need to also have genetic testing. There are great advances in the ability to identify which guys are going to have aggressive forms of treatment versus non-aggressive forms.
So if it's caught early and it's not super aggressive, they can solve this with relatively minimal side effects. But as you would get diagnosed late or diagnosed late with really aggressive prostate cancer, that's when they have to do really tough treatments.
Kelly Scanlon:
So given everything that you do and really what's at stake here, what does success look like for the Prostate Network? As the founder, personally, how do you measure the impact of your work? Because you've been at this now for 15 years.
Steve Hentzen:
I'm a data guy. I was an IT guy and I love data, but this one is not a data-driven success. It is so personal. These people that come to us, we're friends now. It's them getting the best outcomes. That's what I measure. What I want to see, I would love for me to be put out of business. I'm the opposite of every other business person out here. I want to be put out of business, but I don't think that's ever going to happen because they are still going to get prostate cancer.
But what would make it perfect for me as far as success is they would be catching everybody early. But it's not up to the doctors, it's up to changing culture. It's up to changing people's behavior. And I feel like we've already done that to a strong degree here in Kansas City. I feel like I've seen that over the years.
So when I think about when we started and there was nothing to what we've got today where we've got partners all over the place. I gave you examples, right? Bring me more partners. Bring me more, and let's keep changing this. We've got support in our community. You can't believe... from the University of Kansas. They have been amazing, absolutely amazing. I had an IT guy and I had an idea that I had been toying with for years. I wanted an app. I wanted to meet people where they're at and apps are future. And I couldn't figure out how to do it.
I didn't have the skills... Even though I had decades of IT work, I couldn't figure it out. I had somebody even try to help me. I couldn't figure it out. So I asked for help and it's almost done. So we've got an app.
Kelly Scanlon:
What are you going to be able to do with this app?
Steve Hentzen:
We're going to try to give the incentive to diet and exercise to the guys that get diagnosed and then show them how. The messages that I've been talking about on here, do it as delicately and completely as possible with this information and then be able to refine it over time. So we're going to have these interventions. So when you come to our meetings, you're going to hear about stacking the deck in your favor. Stacking the deck in your favor means everybody can improve a little bit, right?
So we're going to try to do that on scale. So even somebody that wouldn't come to our meeting, you can get the app. And so we're going to try to do that. And then what's going to be super unique about it, it's specific. It's very specific about our thing. We're going to try to bring our meeting and these people that use the app together once or twice a year and then refine, get feedback from them and study, "Hey, what worked? What didn't? What didn't you like?" More of the good stuff, take more of the junk out of there, and over the years continue to build our ability to impact people positively.
And so if someone wants to help us, if the business leaders are out there, you want to help us and you can think of distribution points for us, and if you have a way you could reach men, you've got that construction site, you've got your thing, reach out on our website. Stick your email in there, put a note in there and say, "Hey, I'd like to help with this. All ideas are welcome, including helping us to roll that app out."
Because putting information about this in medical places is the common thing. But I want to think outside the box. When they're going to get their medical stuff, there's already enough of that. I want to catch these guys and I want their wives help and I want their children's help.
Kelly Scanlon:
Are there any other ways that people who are interested in supporting this organization can do that?
Steve Hentzen:
We don't do fundraisers, but we have a donate button. We have a podcast, we have a website. You've got an event and you want to have a speaker or... You name it. We'll say yes.
Kelly Scanlon:
Well, thank you for saying yes to this mission and spreading this important message and creating that safe environment that you've described on Wednesday nights and through your podcast. We really appreciate you coming on the show today, Steve, to talk about the topic. And again, thank you for all that you're doing.
Steve Hentzen:
Thank you for having me.
Joe Close:
This is Joe Close, president of Country Club Bank. Thank you to Steve Hentzen for being our guest on this episode of Banking on KC. Steve's personal journey with prostate cancer led him to co-found the Prostate Network, an organization that not only raises awareness of prostate cancer, but also provides a safe and supportive community for other men facing the diagnosis. His story reminds us how a personal challenge can inspire meaningful action that benefits so many others.
At Country Club Bank, we want to remind everyone that taking care of our personal health is as important as taking care of our financial health. Don't wait for a health scare to take action. Remember, healthy people are the foundation of healthy communities. Thanks for tuning in this week. We're Banking on you, Kansas City. Country Club Bank, member FDIC.