ipl-logo

Henrietta Lacks Research Papers

460 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Paper on henrietta lacks

Henrietta Lacks was a poor black tobacco farmer,born in Roanoke, Virginia on August 1 ,1920.Henrietta’s mother died when Henrietta was very young, her dad did not wanted to take care of her and her siblings, so they were sent with different relatives.She grew up with her grandfather.Henrietta died at age of 31 years old of cervical cancer, on October 4, 1951. At the age of twenty-nine she felt a “knot” inside of her.In the year of 1950, she had a full-fledged tumor just three months after she had felt the knot.When she had felt the lump, she told her husband to take her to the doctor, the doctor figured that it was a sore syphilis,but the lump tested negative for syphilis.The local doctor recommended her to go the gynecology clinic at Johns Hopkins, at this time Hopkins was the only major hospital that treated black patients. She started to get treatment, and of course they need her consent ,she signed a consent form but she wasn't fully informed about the treatment. Doctors now have to inform their patient about the whole process they are going to be getting.With Henrietta the doctors took a sample from her tumor and started experimenting with it. After all the experiments they did, the cells turn out to be the first cell line that did not died within days.One thing doctors fail to tell Henrietta was …show more content…

When the doctor took the sample of the cancer and send them to the laboratory,Dr.Gey notice something unusual about this cells.Those cells were taken without her knowledge. Henrietta knew something was wrong even though the doctors assure her that they have killed the cancer

Show More
Related
156 Words | 1 Pages

The book is divided into three parts. The first part talks about Henrietta Lack’s life. Henrietta Lacks went to John Hopkins on September 19, 1950 because she felt a lump in her cervix. A few days later, she was diagnosed with cervical cancer. Then the doctors performed a surgery and later gave her radiation therapy.

Read More
535 Words | 3 Pages

Having the opportunity to discuss the impact of medical research performed on Henrietta Lacks’ cells with doctor George Guy would be an experience like no other. Through the use of Henrietta Lacks’s cells, George Guy created an industry that would fuel research throughout the scientific community. When Henrietta Lacks was admitted to the hospital for radiation treatments, doctors took samples of her cervical cancer cells. Henrietta was not informed that one of the two samples was sent to George Guy, a scientist researching the immortalization of human cells. Guy soon realized that these cells were able to grow outside of the human body, they even grew rapidly.

Read More
700 Words | 3 Pages

30year old Henrietta Lacks underwent radiation treatment for cervical cancer at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore In 1951. During her treatment, George Gey the surgeon who performed the procedure removed pieces of her cervix without her knowledge and sent them to a lab.  Her cells were used to develop the polio vaccine, used in the first space missions to see what would happen to human cells in zero gravity. Henrietta’s cells were the first human cells ever cloned, some of the first genes ever mapped. They have been used to create some of our most important cancer

Read More
929 Words | 4 Pages

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is about the life of the woman whose cells changed the medical field and about the impact those cells have on her family. Henrietta was a black woman who grew up in Clover, Virginia in a family of poor, tobacco farmers. Her mother died when she was young and her father left shortly after, leaving her to be raised by her grandfather, who was also raising her cousin, Day. She later married Day and they moved to Turner Station, outside of Baltimore, Maryland because Day was able to get a decent paying job. Henrietta and Day had five children: Lawrence, Elsie, Sonny, Deborah, and Zakariyya.

Read More
1500 Words | 6 Pages

Sonali Sagar Block: 2B May 12th 2015 The Degradation of Morals and Ethics In the book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks the author Rebecca Skloot tells us about a non-fiction story of an African American women who is diagnosed with cervical cancer and how the medical community exploited her for use of her “immortal” cells. From then onwards the cells have been used for widespread medical advancement and research. There is no denying the good that has come from this as even the polio vaccine was developed from these HeLa cells. Moreover, it has also been aiding with finding a cure for cancer as well as assisting with further research on AIDS.

Read More
869 Words | 4 Pages

About 60 years ago, before African Americans had much respect at all, there was a woman named Henrietta Lacks who was diagnosed with cancer in her cervix. Without asking for permission, Henrietta’s doctors took some of her cells from her cervix, and they took them to do more research on them and tried to grow them for the first time outside of a persons body. Because she was African American, she and the rest of her family were not respected by doctors, or many other people at this time. These cells later became very critical to medical advancements and scientific research for the rest of the world. But, the injustice of this situation raises a large controversy over whether or not this is justified.

Read More
527 Words | 3 Pages

Gey’s lab assistant, Mary, She was hoping for her cells to die. Her cells started to double. She knew her cancer was very strong. It was an amazing result, a scientific experiment that had never been done.

Read More
502 Words | 3 Pages

The event that gave the Lacks knowledge of Henrietta’s cells was when “Gardenia’s brother-in-law, [said] Hopkins had part of Henrietta alive and scientists

Read More
704 Words | 3 Pages

Even after her death at an early age, a crucial part of her still lives on to this very day. This essential part of her is known to scientists around the world as HeLa cells. These cells have been a pivotal part in many major medical breakthroughs throughout the past several decades. These cells have a unique facet about them, Henrietta’s cells from her cervical cancer tissue are immortal and do not die. These cells continue to multiple over and

Read More
847 Words | 4 Pages

When Henrietta went to John Hopkins Hospital she soon found out that she had Cervical Cancer. While she was under anesthetics they took some cells without her knowledge and gave them to a lab. If she had been a white women I feel as if they would have asked her for a sample of her cells and respected her decision whether it be yes or no. The hospital continued to do things that she did not know of.

Read More
239 Words | 1 Pages

Henrietta Lacks was a black tobacco farmer from the south who, in 1950, at the age of 30, she was diagnosed with aggressive cervical cancer. Lacks went to John’s Hopkins medical center for treatment for her cancer. In April of 1951, she underwent surgery to remove the larger tumor on her cervix. Henrietta Lacks, died three days following the surgery. Even though Henrietta Lacks died, her cells from the tumor have lived on and have made a major impact on the biomedical community.

Read More
1020 Words | 5 Pages

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks tells the story of Henrietta, an African-American woman whose cells were used to create the first immortal human cell line. Told through the eyes of her daughter, Deborah Lacks, aided by journalist Rebecca Skloot. Deborah wanted to learn about her mother, and to understand how the unauthorized harvesting of Lacks cancerous cells in 1951 led to unprecedented medical breakthroughs, changing countless lives and the face of medicine forever. It is a story of medical arrogance and triumph, race, poverty and deep friendship between the unlikeliest people. There had been many books published about Henrietta’s cells, but nothing about Henrietta’s personality, experiences, feeling, life style etc.

Read More
743 Words | 3 Pages

Her doctor collected cancerous cells and healthy cells from her cervix and gave them to the cancer researcher, George Otto Gey, who was trying to keep cells alive for more than a couple days. Henrietta endured intense radium treatments, but she still died at the age of 31, leaving her husband and five children behind. An amazing discovery was made Henrietta’s cell were immortal. Racism is prevalent in this book through the limited availability of healthcare, unethical behaviors of the doctors, and how racism affected her family. During this time, there was an extensive lack of medical care for colored people.

Read More
649 Words | 3 Pages

Her cells made it possible to make thousands of vaccines for diseases. During Henrietta’s life she would create a cell line, adjust laws in the medical field, and create medical advances. First and for most, Henrietta Lacks was diagnosed with cervical cancer at John Hopkins. This is where she met George Gey, the doctor who would go on to create her cell line. Her cell lines duplicated into new cells, which is abnormal for an average human cell.

Read More
989 Words | 4 Pages

Bushra Pirzada Professor Swann Engh-302 October 4th 2015 Rhetorical Analysis: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks written by Rebecca Skloot tells the story of a woman named Henrietta Lacks who has her cervical cancer. It further goes to tell the audience how Henrietta altered medicine unknowingly. Henrietta Lacks was initially diagnosed with cervical cancer in 1951; however, the doctors at John Hopkins took sample tissues from her cervix without her permission. The sample tissues taken from Henrietta’s cervix were used to conduct scientific research as well as to develop vaccines in the suture.

Read More

More about Henrietta Lacks Research Papers

Related Topics

Open Document