The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (chapter 7-8)

Drawings to represent Chapter 7 and 8.

Chapter 7

Though the growth of the HeLa cells were indeed miraculous and groundbreaking, the world seemed not to care. Worse, they associated cell culture with Naziism, racism, snakes, and "creepy science fiction." To the doctors this success is revolutionary, to Henrietta's family the news is going to be a source of burden for the rest of their lives. To the world, this was just another unimportant piece of news. 

Chapter 8

Throughout the chapter, Henrietta is described as being in excruciating pain. She does not receive any extra medical attention besides the care she receives during her regular appointments. Henrietta is not a woman who complains or shows struggle, so when she says she is in pain there must be something wrong. The hospital does not admit her in until it appears as if she were close to dying. 

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (chapter 5-6)

Discussion Questions for Chapter 5-6

Chapter 5

1. What are the effects of radiation on Henrietta's body? (pg. 42)
2. Do you think Henrietta slept around like Day did when he wasn't at work? If not, why? (pg. 43)
3. What do you think will happen to Henrietta's daughter Elsie in her condition? (pg. 45)
4. Will the radium treatments have lasting effects on Henrietta's body? (pg. 46)
5. Why didn't the doctors tell Henrietta about her fertility loss? (pg. 47)
6. Was Henrietta hiding the pain that radium treatments gave her? (pg. 48)
7. How come Day never questioned Henrietta's burned torso? (no answer in book)

Chapter 6

1. How does Professor Patillo know Henrietta's family? (no answer in book yet)
2. Is Henrietta's family still affected by her loss? How so? (pg. 51)
3. How much does Deborah Lacks know about what doctors did to her mother and her cells? (pg. 52)
4. How is Henrietta's family affected by the medical outbreak of Henrietta's cells? (pg. 54-55)
5. Do you think Day truly loved Henrietta? (no answer in book)
6. For how long would the author have to attempt to communicate with the Lacks family? (pg. 54)

The Immortal Life of Henreitta Lack (Chapter 3-4)

Timelines of Chapter 3-4

Chapter 3

1. TeLinde develops a theory about invasive carcinoma and carcinoma in situ that could save millions of women from dying of cervical cancer.
2. TeLinde gives presentation about carcinoma in situ and is heckled off stage.
3. Henrietta returns from her first visit to John Hopkins into her normal life of cleaning and cooking.
4. TeLinde calls Doctor George Gey and offers him cervical cancer cells to culture.
5. Doctor Howard Jones finds that Henrietta has epidermoid carcinoma of the cervix, stage 1.
6. Jones tells Henrietta that her cancer is malignant, but she keeps it secret from her family.
7. Henrietta returns for treatment and gives consent to surgery.
8. Henrietta is treated with radium.
9. Surgeon Wharton shaves two small pieces of tissue from Henrietta's cervix for research. 
10. The tissue sample was sent to Doctor George Grey's lab.

Chapter 4

1. The Gey's experiment mediums for suitable cell culture conditions.
2. Margaret Gey hires Minnie to sterilize the cell culture lab.
3. Gey gives his assistant Mary Kubicek the sample of Henrietta's tissues to cut up.
4. Mary cuts the tissue into one-millimeter pieces and labels them "HeLa."
5. Mary puts Henrietta's cells in Doctor Gey's "whirligig."
6. Doctors note good responses to Henrietta's radium treatment.
7. Doctors remove the radium before they send Henrietta home.
8. Mary notices Henrietta's cells turning into a fried egg shape.
9. The HeLa cells begin to multiply every 24 hours.
10. Gey sends his closest colleagues samples of Henrietta's cells.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Quotes (chapter 2)

Notable Quotes from Chapter 2

"No one could have guessed she'd spend the rest of her life with Day--first as a cousin growing up in their grandfather's home, then as his wife" ( pg. 19).
Incest???? This would obviously affect the health of their children. Could this have affected her?

"They spent much of their young lives stooped in those fields, planting tobacco behind mule-drawn plows" (pg. 19).
Of course Henrietta and her family had no choice but to farm and perform other laborious tasks for a living because of the Jim Crow era, but the constant presence of tobacco may have imposed a lasting health issue for Henrietta, especially since she was exposed to the tobacco at an early age, making her more vulnerable to harmful effects.

"Night at the warehouse was a time of booze, gambling, prostitution, and occasional murders as farmers burned through their season's earnings" (pg. 21).
Sounds like there aren't many good adult influences for the children on the farm. This implies two things: the children learn independence and responsibility for themselves, and that some of them will grow up to be like these reckless farmers.

"People wouldn't use words like epilepsy, mental retardation, or neurosyphilis to describe Elsie's condition until years later. To the folks in Lacks Town, she was just simple. Touched. She came into the world so fast, Day hadn't even gotten back with the midwife when Elsie shot right out and hit her head on the floor. Everyone would say maybe that was what left her mind like an infant's" (pg. 23).
As present-day readers know, Elsie's conditions were not due to the fact that she hit her head coming out of the womb. It is because of the mix-up in Elsie's genetics that caused these problems. Fortunately, Henrietta and David's first child Lawrence was healthy. At the delicate age of eighteen, Henrietta has already given birth to two children. Over the course of her life, she will probably have a lot more kids.

"But Gladys always insisted Day would be a no-good husband" (pg. 24).
Day being a bad husband to Henrietta not only affects the stability of their family but also Henrietta's health. If Day catches STI's from sleeping around, then Henrietta would be infected with them, too. To make matters worse, Henrietta will not seek medical attention for these infections, as we can assume from her reluctance to get help with her tumor.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Quotes (chapter 1)

Notable Quotes from Chapter 1

"But I always have thought it was strange, if our mother cells done so much for medicine, how come her family can't afford to see no doctors?"(pg9) --Deborah Lacks
The readers of this book will wonder the same thing. How can doctors use Henrietta's cells as a hero of medicine when the doctors let her family suffer? It seems that the doctors are more interested in what the cells can do for them in terms of money and breakthrough, rather than the ethical codes of fair compensation. The fact that the Lack's are black may have imposed on the doctors that the family would not know that they should be compensated, so they did not bother to do so.

"She was afraid a doctor would take her womb and make her stop having children" (pg 14).
For somebody to care more about their ability to have children than their likeliness to live from a potentially deadly disease, Henrietta must be in extreme economic desperation, considering that having children at the time was mainly to assist families on the farm. She should have immediately sought help instead of worrying about their financial standing.

"She led her through a door to a colored-only exam room" (pg 15).
The hospital segregates between races. As a place that is expected to give equal care to all patients in today's society, it is appalling that the situation in Henrietta's time was discriminatory. Knowing this, it is understandable why Henrietta disliked going to her appointments at the hospital; it is just too unwelcoming.

"This was the era of Jim Crow--when black people showed up at white-only hospitals, the staff was likely to send them away, even if it meant they might die in the parking lot" (pg 15).
Despite this book seeming to be mainly about an medicine miracle, I sense there to be a great emphasis on race. This quote confirms my suspicions; how could Henrietta get proper medical attention when the white doctors are comfortable treating black patients and black patients are uncomfortable being treated by the white doctors? The racial tension may have also affected medical ethics as well.

". . . here she was, three months later, with a full-fledged tumor. Either her doctors had missed it during her last exams--which seemed possible--or it had grown at a terrifying rate" (pg 17).
If Henrietta could palpitate her tumor without any medical experience or struggle in general, then there are ulterior reasons for why they allowed the tumor to grow at extreme rates. Perhaps they did not want to treat her because of her race, or perhaps they wanted her to die and then use her body for study. The reasons are unknown but this gives insight to the readers to not trust the doctors. On the other hand, Henrietta's tumor growth was unforeseen. It is obvious that her cells are extraordinary.

What I Would Like to Learn about Reproduction

This year, I want to learn more about the steps it takes for a baby to form. How can legs, arms, stomach, etc. be formed from just a zygote and a sperm? Knowing this will give me a better understanding of babies, which of course could be important when I have children in the future.

I also want to learn how hormones activate peoples' reproductive systems. Surely there are some stimuli besides the obvious kissing and hugging that trigger sex hormones, probably something psychological perhaps.

So far, we have learned some interesting things about periods, like why girls who hang out together get their periods around the same time of month and why some period cycles have different effects from other menstrual cycles. Maybe we'll learn more interesting things about periods.