In 2009, a urologist told me I needed to have my bladder removed to treat my stage IV bladder cancer. When I asked him how many similar operations he'd done, he told me he averaged at least one a month. I knew then that I needed to go somewhere with more resources and experience.

I'm lucky to live in Houston, so I chose MD Anderson. Upon arriving, I learned that my surgeon, Ashish Kamat, M.D., removed more than twice as many...