LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A leukemia survivor credits his journey for setting him on the path to go to medical school.

In the weeks leading up to Saturday, August 29, 2009, 13-year-old Bradley Wilson was feeling sick. Wilson had gone to a pediatrician and was told that it was just a virus.

His parents realized something was really wrong — Wilson couldn’t walk, was going in and out of consciousness and his skin was turning gray.

Wilson’s parents took him to the Norton Children’s Hospital emergency department. Wilson had leukemia.

“Dealing with everything else besides the cancer was just as big of a deal as dealing with the cancer itself,” said Wilson.

Wilson had contracted a staph infection that his body couldn’t fight because he had no immune system because of leukemia. The infection had gotten into the blood and spread throughout the body and he became septic.

One Wilson recovered from his staph infection he was treated by Dr. Ashok Raj, an oncologist with Norton Children’s Cancer Institute. Wilson began chemotherapy treatment right away for leukemia.

Wilson went home from the hospital close to Thanksgiving 2009. He wound up missing his eighth-grade year as he focused on his recovery and physical therapy.

He entered high school as planned and continued with chemotherapy. He finished chemo in January 2013.

In October 2013, his senior year, he began to notice some vision problems. He had experienced a cancer relapse in his spinal column. Wilson then had to undergo a month of radiation and a couple of years of chemotherapy. He attended less than half of his senior year and delayed going to the University of Kentucky for a year.

He went into remission and completed chemotherapy in May 2016.

“Going through something like I did, it’s one of the things that I can control,” said Wilson. “There was so much that was outside of my control that was what I turned my focus to.”

Wilson volunteered his time to help other children and teens going through similar experiences like his.

“I feel like I’ve been given a unique set of circumstances to help those people and I want to do that,” he said.

Wilson graduated with a degree in chemical engineering in May 2019. He is in the first year of medical school at the University of Cincinnati.

Wilson enjoys the combination of scientific problem-solving and working with others that medicine provides. He knows there is a long journey ahead of him, but will maintain the same positive outlook that served him during his treatment.

“There is much more to life after cancer and that life is not over in the middle of it,” said Wilson.