In honor of Pam Kubacki
Pam Kubacki says her survival is a miracle. In 1999 she underwent surgery to repair a hernia. Her doctor found problematic tissue during the procedure. After testing she was told that the tissue was not cancerous.
In June 2000, she underwent another surgery to remove a painful pelvic growth. Kubacki began to feel pain again several months later. Another pelvic mass had developed and was visibly increasing in size. Kubacki’s surgeon assured her that the growth was benign, but her ObGyn recommended that she go to UNC to see Dr. John Boggess. Kubacki went to UNC with a goal: to end the cycle of redeveloping growths.
“Dr. Boggess immediately scheduled the surgery for Dec. 14 at UNC,” Kubacki said. “We did not know if the surgery would be exploratory or radical at that point. However, it was certain that the surgery needed to be performed soon.”
While Kubacki was being prepared for the operation, a team of doctors working with Dr. Boggess helped determine that the growth was cancerous based on tissues from her previous two surgeries. Kubacki was diagnosed with adenosarcoma in the hours before her operation. Dr. Boggess performed a 15-hour massive resection of a sarcoma with the help of an orthopaedic oncologist and a plastic surgeon. The surgery required removal of bone, muscle and part of the bladder. Boggess says the collaborative effort is what saved Kubacki’s life. She returned home on Christmas Day and has been cancer-free ever since.
“The cancer I had was so rare that nobody had looked for it,” Kubacki said. “Dr. Boggess was able to determine something that another lab was not. His team saved my life.”
Kubacki, a mother of three, has been married for 39 years. Her husband had a heart transplant on July 7, 2004. She says that she and her husband are living miracles.
“The survival rate for the rare type of cancer I had is not high,” Kubacki said. “Dr. Boggess did what he needed to do to make me a survivor. It would be accurate to say that he is Superman.”