Dr. Jerri Nielsen FitzGerald who treated her own breast cancer at South Pole, dies

BOSTON – Dr. Jerri Nielsen FitzGerald, who diagnosed and treated her own breast cancer before a dramatic rescue from the South Pole, has died. She was the only doctor among 41 staff at the National Science Foundation’s Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station in winter 1999 when she discovered a lump in her breast.  Rescue was out of the question. Because of the extreme weather conditions, the station is closed to the outside world for the winter. She had no choice but to treat the disease herself, with help from colleagues she trained to care for her and U.S.-based doctors she stayed in touch with via satellite e-mail.

She performed a biopsy on herself with the help of staff. A machinist helped her with her IV and test slides, and a welder helped with chemotherapy.  “More and more as I am here and see what life really is, I understand that it is not when or how you die but how and if you truly were ever alive,” she wrote in an e-mail to her parents in June, 1999 from the South Pole.

Doctor in dramatic South Pole rescue dies at 57 – Yahoo News.