Neighbor News
20-Year Cancer Survivor Celebrates Life Through Cooking
As part of her ongoing journey of healing, Diana is working on finishing her passion project: a cook book.
The year was 1998. The day had started like any other when Diana Russell noticed she had started spotting out of the blue. In the absence of any other symptoms, Diana wasn’t worried about what could have caused the spotting, but she made an appointment with her primary care physician.
Within the month, Diana would learn the most terrible news: She had stage 1B cervical cancer.
Cervical cancer used to be the leading cause of cancer death for women in the United States. Fortunately, with the advent of the Pap smear, the number of cases and deaths from cervical cancer has dropped dramatically over the last 40 years.
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Still, the American Cancer Society estimates that more than 13,000 women will be diagnosed with cervical cancer in 2018.
When Diana heard the devastating news of her diagnosis, she sprang right into action.
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“I felt overwhelming sadness when the doctor told me my diagnosis, but I also needed to know what I could do right away,” Diana recalls.
She worked with Dr. Morteza Dini, chief of gynecological oncology at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center, to come up with a care plan. Ultimately, Diana underwent a radical hysterectomy, followed by radiation treatment.
Once treatment was over, Diana didn’t skip a beat and was right back to enjoying life. She returned to work at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center, where she still works to this day in the health information management department, and took a vacation to Cancun.
Twenty years later, Diana is still cancer free and celebrating survivorship in a particularly special way this year: She is working on a cook book that has been in the works since she was 20 years old. Her prize recipe is orange cous cous cake.
“I think about my cancer diagnosis every day,” Diana says. “I feel like I have come a long way since that day, when I learned I had cervical cancer. And I am very proud to work here at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center. The cancer center team here is the greatest. They treated me very well.”
In honor of Cervical Cancer Awareness Month, Dr. Dini says there are steps women can take to defend themselves against the disease. Women may be able to prevent cervical cancer altogether by getting vaccinated against the human papillomavirus, which is the cause of the majority of cervical cancer cases.
In addition to vaccination, women should undergo regular Pap smears so that precancerous or early stages of cervical cancer can be detected and therefore easier to treat compared to more advanced stages of cervical cancer.
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About Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center
Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center is a 397-bed non-profit teaching hospital located in the Lake View neighborhood on Chicago's North Side. The medical center has a Level I Trauma Center and a Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, the highest designations awarded by the state of Illinois, and offers comprehensive inpatient and outpatient care, including cardiovascular, oncology, digestive health and neurosciences services. A recipient of numerous awards for quality and clinical excellence, Advocate Illinois Masonic has achieved Magnet designation for excellence in nursing services from the American Nurses Credentialing Center. The medical center has also been named a Leader in LGBT Healthcare Equality by the Human Rights Campaign's Healthcare Equality Index. Advocate Illinois Masonic is part of Advocate Health Care, the largest fully integrated health system in Illinois. For more information, visit www.advocatehealth.com/masonic.
