Jennifer's Story

Finding Fun in the Hospital with Ewings Sarcoma

When Jennifer and her mom, Lynn, talk about Jennie's treatment at the University of Minnesota, one word comes up over and over again - the word family. The kids on 5B forge strong ties with their primary nurses and doctors, becoming an extended family. Lynn says, "You get to know each other on the fifth floor. The moms start to talk and pretty soon we're wheeling kids from room to room. The other families are your way to get through this: and your primary nurses - they're a really important part of getting through this intact." Lynn and Jennie also credit the care of Jennie's primary oncologist, Dr. Marquis Hodes, a fellow in the division of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology, and Dr. Stella Davies, who performed Jennie's bone marrow transplant.

Jennie was diagnosed with Ewings Sarcoma in May at the end of her sophomore year of high school. Ewing's is a rare form of cancer that grows between the marrow spaces in the bones, in Jennie's case, the left pelvic bone. It can be tough to cure. After surgery and a year of chemotherapy, it appeared that Jennie's cancer had been eradicated. Despite the initial response to treatment, however, the first scans showed bad news. The cancer was back, this time in her lung. Jennie would need radiation and a bone marrow transplant.

During the times Jennie was hospitalized, several other teenagers were also being treated on 5B. The group quickly became, and remain, friends. Birthday parties, holiday parties, "last chemo" parties and pranks helped them to take this serious cancer business with some smiles. For party decorations they used the materials at hand. Latex gloves draped with hospital towels became ghosts at Halloween. They were resourceful, too, in the matter of practical jokes. One time, Jennie's friend Erin floated a goldfish in an IV bag and waited for the nurses to come in and scream. A summer following treatment, Jennie and five of her "chemo buddies" spent a week at camp together in Montana, where they became known as the "Minnesota Homies."

After Jennie completed her chemotherapy, the transition from 5B to the bone marrow transplant unit was an adjustment, almost like leaving home. The time spent planning her admission to the BMT unit was an anxious one for the family; but once Jennie was admitted they started to form new ties, with the unit nurses, with Dr. Davies, who refers to Jennie as "one of my favorites" and with Care Partners, Pat Kasell. Jennie spent 38 days as an inpatient on the BMT unit. Her transplant date, Day 0 in BMT terminology, was October 16, 1996. Since then, Jennie has had several sets of scans that show she is free of cancer. Her marrow is still growing back, however, and she must come to the BMT clinic regularly to receive infusions of platelets and red blood cells. If her counts drop, she receives G-CSF, a growth factor that increases the number of her white blood cells.

Jennie's cancer treatment is still ongoing, but she is looking to the future with confidence. She has since graduated with honors from her high school class, in spite of missing more than a year of school because of her treatment. She is also currently finishing a degree in nursing, specializing in pediatric-oncology. Jennie says, "I didn't really have a plan (for a career) before I got sick," now there seems to be nothing more fitting.