Seventeen years ago, Sandra Hillburn’s daughter brought her to a doctor in NYC. The doctor thought Hillburn was having a stroke, and sent her for a CAT scan. In fact, Hillburn was suffering from a stage 4 glioblastoma, the worst kind of brain tumor.
“By the time I got to Duke, I could hardly walk or talk. And I was so weak, breathing was becoming difficult,” she said. “I couldn’t wait for the surgery. And when I met Allan Friedman before the surgery, I had such confidence in him. He was just so kind and brilliant.”
The surgery was a success. Hillburn felt better afterward, but her doctors had to find a new treatment plan.
A clinical trial of an experimental vaccine therapy led by Duke neurosurgeon John Sampson became her next treatment option. Before she knew what the study entailed, she said yes.
“If they thought it was good for me, I did too. Yes. I didn’t think I had that much to lose,” she said.
Read/listen to Sandra's story, now part of the Cancer Letter's Cancer History Project.