Lake Regional Health System | Thrive | Fall 2017

lakeregional.com 5 L inda McGowen didn’t pay much attention to her nag- ging cough. It was odd — she was almost never sick — but she assumed it was just allergies. Her kids, however, insisted she visit her doctor. Lake Regional’s Mark Shen, D.O., CMD, HMDC, ordered a chest X-ray and then a CT scan. Next came a biopsy. It revealed cancer — stage III non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. “I was devastated,” says McGowen, who retired to the lake from Chicago with her husband, Don, in 2002. “I thought, ‘Can I get through this?’” Dr. Shen assured her she had much reason to hope, and she received the same message from Michael Wang, M.D., her oncologist at Lake Regional Cancer Center. She chose Lake Regional Cancer Center because it was close to home and offered the same lifesaving medications and treatments she could get elsewhere. Once McGowen began receiving care, she found more reasons to recommend it. “The Cancer Center staff and Dr. Wang are wonder- ful, so positive,” she says. “Everybody has kind words. It’s uplifting, and I felt like I was in good hands.” Rising above McGowen’s treatment in- cluded six weeks of chemo- therapy, which she says were tough but did not break her. “I just knew I was going to go down for a while and I would deal with it, and then I would start coming back up,” she says. Results were good, and McGowen has been in remission since her chemo ended in March 2016. “I’m feeling good,” she says. “I golf. I travel. And I’m alive. I wake up every morning and say, ‘Thank you, God.’ If I hadn’t gone in to see Dr. Shen and he hadn’t acted so fast, I don’t know if I would be here.” Close-to-home cancer care At Lake Regional Cancer Center, we’re devoted to helping people with cancer. We offer state-of-the-art therapies that can find and treat cancer. And our team is made up of compassionate providers who will treat you, and the people you love, like family. Learn more at lakeregional.com/cancer . hope WATCH A VIDEO Linda McGowen shares her Lake Regional Cancer Center story at lakeregional.com/ cancer . Encouraging Linda McGowen was in good, kind hands at Lake Regional Cancer Center