How The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks

The “knot” persisted since before her last chid was born and, after she gave birth, she experienced severe hemorrhaging. Her primary care doctor checked her for syphilis, but it came back negative. Lacks returned to Johns Hopkins and her physician, Howard W. Jones performed a biopsy of the mass growing on her cervix. The results revealed she had cervical malignant epidermoid carcinoma. Physicians studying the sample in 1970 discovered it was actually adenocarcinoma, but the treatment would not have differed and it was a common mistake during the time.Henrietta Lacks did not know the second samples taken without her knowledge would lead medical advances and still be used in research

In August 1951, Lacks discovered a “knot” on her womb. Many of her relatives suggested the cause of the knot was from pregnancy. Even though they assumed correctly, after giving birth, she suffered from a serve hemorrhage. After a visit to her primary care doctor, she visited the only hospital in the area that treated black patients, Johns Hopkins. Her doctor took a biopsy of the mass for laboratory testing. Soon after, Lack’s doctor diagnosed her with cervical cancer. During her radiation treatments, the doctor removed two cervical samples from Lacks without her knowledge.

In the year 1951, Henrietta starting feeling discomfort and felt a knot in her womb. She went to the Hopkins Hospital, which is the only hospital that would give care to colored patients. This is the time of the Jim Crow era. where there is a practice of segregating black people. She was diagnosed with cervical cancer and treated with radium and x-ray therapy. This is also the time where scientist are trying to grow cells out of the body. Some of the tissue from Henrietta was removed from her tumor and sent down to George Gey's lab at Hopkins to be cultured, or grown, in test tubes. Neither Henrietta nor any of her family members knew about the tissue sample—and neither Gey

Henrietta Lacks was a poor black tobacco farmer from Virginia and a mother of five. She died on October 4, 1951 at the early age of 31 from cervical cancer. Without her knowledge, cells from her cancerous tumor were taken. They were used to create the first human immortal cell line for medical research. HeLa cells as they are called have had a major impact on modern medicine such as the polio vaccine, cloning, in vitro fertilization and gene mapping. Even though Henrietta Lacks’ contribution to modern medicine was groundbreaking, she remained virtually unknown for years.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot tells the story of how the world famous HeLa cell line was created and the medical, legal, and cultural issues surrounding it all. This book doesn’t just cover how scientists used these cells to create life saving vaccines and treatments, it shows us the woman behind these extraordinary cells and what she and her family have went through. The woman behind these ever prevalent cells is Henrietta Lacks. At the time she was a poor, African

After driving nearly 20 miles to Hopkins hospital, Henrietta was seen by a doctor on duty Howard Jones who looked through her medical record to find that Henrietta has nose and throat problems, possible sickle cell, and untreated syphilis and gonorrhea. Henrietta had refused treatments because she felt fine. Rebecca Skloot noted that to Henrietta going to Hopkins was like ‘entering a foreign country where she couldn 't speak the language’, because of her seventh grade education, she like most black patients only went to the hospital when they felt like they had no choice.

1951 came around the corner and Henrietta was in great pain. She had numerous amounts of tumors in her organs. Better yet, her organs were failing. She received several blood transfusions the doctor had to put an end to it. The word spreaded out very quickly and reached her husband's work, the steel mill. By now, the whole community heard about it and was in on to help her. Another one of Henrietta’s cousins, Emmett Lacks, gathered up eight men and they went to the hospital

In the book “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks”, the author Rebecca Skloot introduces the reader to a painful story of Lack’s family. The main character of the book, Henrietta Lack, had survived the interplay of poverty, race and science, as well as one of the significant medical discoveries of the century. In her book, the author narrates the lucid science tackling the issue of spookiness of the cells from spiritual perspective that the family was associated with while acknowledging that their mother was immortal. In fact, the author analyses compressively the various aspects of Henrietta Lack’s life and the HeLa cells which have made her life endless. "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" dwells upon an uncanny thing in the cancer cells of the cervix of Henrietta Lack.

In 1951, a young black woman admitted herself into Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore to have doctors look at what she described as a knot on her womb. It turned out Henrietta had an aggressive case of cervical cancer, and almost 9 months after first visiting

During her treatment for cervical cancer at John Hopkins Hospital, her cells had been taken without her consent and knowledge. Henrietta's cervical cancer had first been diagnosed by the gynecologist, Howard Jones. After her appointment with Howard Jones, Henrietta was referred for surgical removal of the tumor. Starting from her surgery, samples of her cells were taken and given to George Gey. George Gey was the head of tissue culture at John Hopkins.

The maltreatment of Henrietta Lacks, like other African Americans, is primarily due to the historical derogation of the racial group since they are perceived as subordinates within America, including the medical world. African Americans are branded as inferior in the fields of gynecology, biology, and genetics due to America’s historical degradation of African Americans seeping into the medical world. The gynecological practices presented within the text showcase the lack of basic ethical considerations of women, especially African American women since they received maltreatment due to both their race and gender. For example, the doctors who stole Henrietta’s cells felt that giving consent was not even worth it because the “colored women” do not pay for their treatment so stealing cells was their form of payment, but the hospital still had Lacks fill

When Henrietta was this far away from home and in a new environment, it frightened her into staying quiet and therefore, not understanding what her treatment was. Although the doctors weren’t treating her differently than other patients because of her race, she almost needed to be advised differently because she didn’t understand what was happening to her body. Skloot states, “For Henrietta, walking into Hopkins was like entering a foreign country where she didn’t speak the language…she’d never heard the words cervix or biopsy.” (pg 16) By feeling uncomfortable and unwelcomed in the hospital environment, it created a toxic cycle of African Americans stating that they are fine when something is seriously wrong with their health and are in need professional care. This fear seems to be rooted in the oppression that white doctors set on black patients because these doctors are seen to be of a higher class at the time. Proving truth behind Henrietta's fear was the unethical mindset of Richard Wesley TeLinde, who used poor patients’ tissue without telling them, believing that this was their payment of their free service. Researchers and doctors with similar mindsets to TeLinde’s is what created the power institutional racism which lead African American, like Henrietta, to have no

The 1950s are very different times in America, especially for blacks that are seeking medical care from hospitals or clinics, where racial discrimination is still quite widespread. The struggles that blacks face at this time period are only made worse by the poor treatment from the doctors and the sheer disregard for black patients, in comparison to white patients, “But several studies have shown that black patients were treated and hospitalized at later stages in their illnesses than white patients. And once hospitalized, they got fewer pain medications and higher mortality rates” (Skloot, 64). Henrietta’s life is greatly affected by the racism in

In 1951 there was a young black lady who was named Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta Lacks was a tobacco farmer in Clover, Virginia. Her mother died giving birth and her father moved the family to Clover, where the children were distributed among some of the close relatives. In January of 1951 she went to John Hopkins hospital, which was the only place close to her that treated black patients at the time. Lacks described a “knot” in her stomach that ended up being cervical cancer. During her treatments two samples from her

Although she was taken from the world too soon, Henrietta Lacks was a warm hearted woman, and though unbeknownst to her, she would pave the way for the medical field and greatly expand our understanding of one of the nation’s