Less Radical

At the end of the 19th century, a New York surgeon determined that the only way to cure breast cancer was with radical surgery. For the next hundred years, millions of breast cancer survivors bore the mark of his disfiguring approach.

Our story begins exactly fifty years ago. On a fall weekend in late September 1974, a former dancer from Michigan and a young surgeon from Pittsburgh met just outside Washington, DC. The treatment of breast cancer would never be the same.

Introducing Less Radical, the true story of Dr. Bernie Fisher, the surgeon-scientist who revolutionized the way we treat breast cancer. After generations of surgeons subjecting women to brutal, disfiguring surgeries, Bernie found a better way. And the thanks he got? A performative, misguided Congressional hearing that destroyed his reputation and haunted him until his death.

Over six episodes, radiation oncologist Dr. Stacy Wentworth will take you into operating rooms, through the halls of Congress, and into the labs where breakthrough cancer treatments were not only developed, but discovered.

The first episode of Less Radical debuts September 25.