In 2025, Rachel Passarella, a 42-year-old nurse based in Sarasota, Florida, was misdiagnosed multiple times before a swollen red patch on her tongue turned her life upside down.
The single mother of four recently opened up about her journey, admitting that what several doctors dismissed as a “canker sore” (aphthous ulcers) ended up being a life-threatening disease.
Highlights
- Rachel Passarella, a 42-year-old nurse from Florida, was told by several doctors that a red patch on her tongue was nothing but a “canker sore.”
- Six months later, it was diagnosed as a life-threatening disease, which led to partial removal of her tongue and lymph nodes.
- Days after her surgery, Passarella faced a health crisis that caused major blood loss and nearly cost her life.
The flawed medical assessments delayed her treatment by months, and at one point, she had to be airlifted to a trauma hospital to save her life.
“I texted my teenage daughter, ‘This is an emergency. I’m going to d*e,’ a sentence I never imagined typing at just 42 years old,” Passarella said about the near-fatal incident.
Rachel Passarella thought her worsening “canker sore” was triggered by a breakup
Image credits: Rachel Passarella
Rachel Passarella first noticed a red spot on her tongue the size of “half a pinkie fingernail” in September 2025, but didn’t think much of it, she revealed to Newsweek.
She had just gone through a “devastating” breakup, “the kind that knocks the wind out of you and leaves your whole body buzzing with stress,” and assumed the sore patch was her body reacting to the emotional turbulence.
Image credits: GoFundMe/Rachel Passarella
When it didn’t heal after salt water rinses, she mentioned it to her dentist during a routine appointment three weeks later.
The dentist checked it and dismissed it, saying, “You’re healthy. You don’t smoke or drink. It’s probably a canker sore.” She instructed Passarella to avoid mouthwash or any irritants.
“I trusted her,” Passarella reminisced about the dentist visit. “I even felt silly for worrying. I knew about tongue cancer from my medical background, but as I didn’t match the statistics, I thought I was fine.”
Image credits: GoFundMe/Rachel Passarella
By November, the size of the spot had doubled, and Passarella decided to visit an ear, nose, and throat (ENT) doctor, who again dismissed it as a “stress-related inflammatory lesion.” She was prescribed a steroid mouthwash and oral medications.
When Passarella asked for a biopsy, the ENT doctor said, “You’re not a smoker, not a drinker, and not a man. Your risk is low.”
However, the pain kept worsening, and Passarella had lost 15 pounds in two months.
Rachel Passarella had to pay $400 out of pocket for the right diagnosis: tongue cancer
Image credits: Rachel Passarella
In December 2025, a different dentist she visited to have her wisdom tooth removed was the first to suggest that the red patch might be more than just a sore. He and another dentist scanned it with a handheld oral cancer screening device and said that it was likely cancer.
“The timing couldn’t have been worse,” Passarella told Newsweek. “The day before, I’d lost my job — and my health insurance — because the company went bankrupt. I was supposed to take my kids on a Christmas vacation. Instead, I was being told I might have cancer.”
Image credits: Rachel Passarella
The dentists referred Passarella to an oral surgeon, whom she could see in mid-January. He also dismissed her concerns despite Passarella's willingness to pay $900 of her own for a biopsy.
In February 2026, she went back to the ENT doctor after the lesion tripled in size and said, “I’m not leaving until you biopsy this.” She paid $400 out of pocket for the procedure.
On March 2, before starting a new job, she learned that she had squamous cell carcinoma in her tongue. She informed her employer and found an oncologist she trusted.
After CT scans showed that the cancer might have spread to her lymph nodes on the right side, Passarella underwent a partial glossectomy on March 13.
Image credits: Facebook
“The tumor was 8 mm deep—an invasive carcinoma,” she said. “Tongue cancer is aggressive and spreads quickly.”
More tissues from her tongue and 40 lymph nodes were removed on April 21 in another invasive surgery, but it couldn’t contain the disease. On April 24, she was diagnosed with Stage 2 tongue cancer.
“I’ve lost 35-37 percent of my tongue and require extensive speech therapy and will require scans every three months for the next two years, then yearly for five years,” Passarella said about her latest diagnosis.
Rachel Passarella battled a near-fatal crisis a week after her oral surgery
Image credits: GoFundMe/Rachel Passarella
On April 29, 15 minutes after tucking her kids and herself into bed, she woke up choking on what she first assumed was mucus, but was actually blood squirting out from her mouth.
“I knew instantly that an artery had burst,” Passarella said about the incident after revealing the text she sent to her teenage daughter.
It took eight minutes for her to get to the emergency room, and by then she had lost 20% of her total blood volume. Her oral surgeon instructed the ER doctor to put her on a ventilator, stop the bleeding, and airlift her to a trauma hospital, where they found the ruptured lingual artery and stitched it.
“The medics told me I was a miracle,” Passarella revisited.
Image credits: Rachel Passarella
Having gone through the ordeal herself, Passarella now speaks on social media and at dental schools to spread awareness about the disease.
“Tongue cancer is one of the most misdiagnosed cancers,” she told Newsweek. “Most patients are dismissed for five to six months. Some lose their entire tongue. Some lose their lives.”
In an interview with People magazine, she said that she felt “lucky” that despite the delayed diagnosis, she has survived, even though she is “mentally and physically exhausted.”
However, she still panics whenever she feels mucus in her mouth during sleep, reminding her of her “near-de*th experience.”
She currently has a live GoFundMe, seeking to raise $25,000 for a PET scan, a car, basic living expenses, and support for her children.
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