Eric Serra, in remission from dazzling cancer: “I spent the most trying six months of my life”

“It started last January. I wake up one morning and notice a lump in my abdomen, under my ribs on the right side.. This is how the story of the musician’s cancer begins. “Not worried at first, I noticed that it was getting bigger – it was in the shape of a sausage – and I ended up contacting my gastroenterologist who has been following me for years because of an ulcer that I have since the age of 25. She asks me to come by for a consultation and immediately sent me for an ultrasound the same day”.

This is where the diagnosis falls like a cleaver: it is a tumor. The composer had no warning signs, except for severe fatigue after a concert, given in mid-December.

Rapid small bowel lymphoma

Once the ultrasound is over, Eric Serra immediately returns to his doctor. “Back in my gastroenterologist’s office, we discuss the results, she confirms that it’s cancer and the world is collapsing around me” confides the composer, who says he is used to playing sports, and does not have any particular health problems.

“Psychologically, my mother having died of cancer when I was a child, I took a big hit on the head. It meant I was going to die. I then underwent additional examinations, including a scanner and a PET-scan, before being taken care of by Pr Catherine Thieblemont, head of the oncology department at Saint-Louis Hospital and cancer specialist for whom I suffered: lymphoma of the small intestine” says Eric Serra again.

Six chemotherapy sessions

The musician is taken care of very quickly to start a chemotherapy protocol of six sessions, spaced out by three weeks each.

“Professor Thieblemont immediately explained to me that my cancer was progressing very quickly but that if the treatment worked, it would disappear very quickly too. I had the chance to integrate an American clinical study, so I received the usual treatment and an experimental treatment in addition. At the end of the second session of chemotherapy, the scanner and the PET-scan showed that there was nothing left..

The musician reveals to have lived well the first three sessions, a little less the last three. On May 13, he finished his treatment and could definitely say he was in remission. He will continue to take exams every six months but the worst is behind him. Only great fatigue persists today, accentuated by the Covid infection that he caught just after the end of his sessions.

Psychological pressure and fear of Covid

Although he lived relatively well, Serra does not want to minimize the impact of this ordeal. “It’s not six months where we wait for it to happen, it’s a real test, not a walk in the park”. The composer also waited three long weeks between the first diagnosis and the moment of talking about it to those around him, because he “wanted to know the ins and outs” of his illness before confiding in his relatives.

Finally, he lived throughout his treatment with the fear of catching Covid-19, because in the words of his doctor, “if you catch it during treatment, you are unlikely to survive” he remembers. “So I spent almost five months being extremely careful of everything, wearing an FFP2 mask in all public places, eating alone…”. A difficult psychological ordeal which was added to the physical ordeal experienced by the musician.