Henrietta Lacks and the HeLa Cell
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- Henrietta'sBeginning
- The Move
- Henrietta's discovery
- Henrietta Lacks was a tobacco farmer and the wife of a steelworker. She was a mother of 2 at the time, Lawrence and Elsie, and lived in Roanoke, Virginia. She was remembered as having hazel eyes, a small waist, size 6 shoes, and always wearing red nail polish. Her family had always lived in a two story ex-slave quarters log cabin. The only real income they had was working the tobacco fields as Henrietta has since she was very young.
- Hospital Visit
- Henrietta, alongside her husband and two kids move to Maryland with the encouragement of their cousin. In Maryland, they had 3 more children together; David Jr., Deborah, and Joseph. When they moved, they placed their oldest daughter Elsie in the Hospital for the Negro Insane.
- Dr. Gey's Discovery
- Henrietta did a pelvic self-examination where she discovered a marble sized lump high up in her vagina.
- The Spread of the HeLa Cell
- In the colored section of the John Hopkins Hospital gynecology clinic, Dr. Howard Jones examined the large and malignant tumor. The tumor that was sitting on her cervix could only be treated by radium treatments. Dr. Jones took a biopsy of her cells and sent them to Dr. George Gey.
- Dr. Gey examined Henrietta's cancer cells, the same as all his other patients. He collects the cells of every cancer patient in hopes of finding cells that can live and grow outside the body. While his assistant Mary Kubicek was doing her routine checks, she found that Henrietta's cells kept growing. Henrietta's Cells doubled every 20 to 24 hours. Gey hoped the cells would lead to a cure. The cells were named the HeLa cell.
- Not soon after the discovery, scientists all over the world wanted samples of the cells. The cell line has contributed to a plethora of medical breakthroughs, including the worlds fist polio vaccine. The biggest polio pandemic broke out in the 1950s and Jonas Salk devised the first vaccine using the live cells of Henrietta. The Tuskegee Institute started mass production and a distribution center of the HeLa cell by this time, which made it easier for scientists to use the cell in their studies
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