After giving her official consent for any treatments or surgery the doctors deemed necessary, Henrietta was once again led to the Johns Hopkins ward for colored women. Because she didn’t really have any other options, Henrietta gave the doctors her consent for receiving the treatments that they deemed necessary. Indeed, this radioactive material is so powerful that, when administered in high doses, it can even cause severe burns. But while radium is great for killing cancer cells, unfortunately, it can also destroy the healthy cells that it comes into contact with. Back then, cervical cancer was treated at John Hopkins with radium - a highly radioactive material. When her doctors had the results of the biopsy, Henrietta learned that she was suffering from a very aggressive type of cervical cancer - stage I epidermoid carcinoma. For a while at least, Henrietta’s life continued its regular course. After her check-up, Henrietta returned to her daily routine of cooking for the family, looking after the children, and cleaning the house without putting too much thought into her medical examination. Henrietta was sent home after the doctors took a sample of her lump and sent it to the pathology lab for diagnosis. In the early 1950s, about a decade later, Henrietta walked into a gynecology examination room, where doctors found a lump on her cervix. In the hope of a better life, they decided to move to Sparrows Point, near Baltimore. Because times were very difficult for small tobacco farmers, Day and Henrietta were struggling financially. Soon enough they had children of their own. The two cousins had a very strong bond and they ended up getting married when Henrietta was 20. Although children used to work a lot back in the day, Henrietta found the time to play with her cousin Day. Henrietta’s family worked on a tobacco farm, so she had to help out by doing different tasks such as hauling the leaves to South Boston and harvesting the plants. In the 1920s, in a small town called Roanoake, a small black girl who would forever change medical science was born. The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks Key Idea #1: A poor black American woman by the name of Henrietta Lacks dies of a very aggressive form of cancer.
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