Cardiologist and 2022 vice presidential candidate Willie Ong announced on Saturday that he has been diagnosed with cancer.

In an Aug. 29 video posted on Saturday, Ong, popularly known as “Doc Willie,” said he had been in hospital for several days. He recorded the video to address his followers when he was at his strongest.

Ong recalled that around April 2023, he began having difficulties during medical missions.

On August 18 or 19 of this year, he suffered, among other things, from severe back pain.

“The worst pain of my life. 10 out of 10. You will cry. A whole night without sleep… The pain is like a knife stabbing you in the back over and over again,” Ong said in a mixture of English and Filipino.

After several tests, he was finally diagnosed with a rare, 16-centimeter sarcoma in his abdomen – one of the largest his doctors had ever seen. The tumor was hidden behind the heart and in front of the spine, and blocked, to varying degrees, Ong’s esophagus, inferior vena cava and right atrium.

Ong said he has been undergoing chemotherapy since then.

Editor’s note: This is an updated article. Originally published with the headline “‘The worst pain of my life’: Willie Ong diagnosed with cancer.”