CANCER killed her; an inoperable cancer. Inoperable cancer nearly always kills.
Perhaps we should focus on the fact that there have been zilch, zero, nada advancements made in the last few decades for such cancers as lung, liver, pancreatic, stomach, and other typically inoperable cancers.
The pharma companies, oncologists, and researchers just LOVE to have you looking for any little thing in her background that might have "caused" her cancer, to cover up the fact that they are getting rich on chemo despite their abject failure to produce results. Why, they bank on the fact that your family, when faced with this, will cling to the 1% "hope" that they offer. The elixir peddlers of our time.
Get on with the dissecting of her life; hundreds of other innocents will die tomorrow having been shoved full of worthless chemo....but hey...the oncologists will relax this weekend at their lake homes; and the CEO of Merck might jet off to Monaco.
This is the only "business" that rewards abject failure; and it has for years. Cut them off at the knees (no insurance payments for futile treatments) and we might get some results.
Your comments regarding pharmaceutical houses and oncologists were unfortunate. There have been major advances in chemo pharmaceuticals over the last fifteen years. The inference that the cancers you listed have received short shrift so huge profits could be made by the pharmaceutical industry and oncologists reflects a complete lack of knowledge on the subject. Why would pharmaceutical houses develop phamaceuticals for any cancers, if profits were the sole motivator as you implied?
Oncologist treat real people with real family members. Many times their patients are relatives or people they have known for decades, friends and family members of friends. Your inference that these people would push off medications they knew wouldn't work, just so they could make a buck was simply untrue. And the charge flies in the face of medical professionals who are crushed when they have to explain to family members that there isn't much they can do, but try some things that have shown little success.
If it were your friend's mom, would you withhold a medication that might be somewhat helpful to her? If it would prolong her life for six months to a year, would you tell her daughter that you were sorry, but even though a certain med had been helpful in 15% of the cases where it was used, you weren't going to waste the money on her mom?
The real profits today are reaped on medications that are showing great success. They will be used in the vast majority of cases, and those profits will help to pay for research on new medications.
It is preposterous to claim that the only reason the pharmacueutical industry hasn't made more progress, is because we haven't cut off their funding, yet this is precisely the claim you sought to make.
There are a few other aspect of this that I did not mention.
The profit margins on chemo medications are very slim. The costs are high. Many insurance plan payments as well as state and federal government payments have been cut to the bone.
Some oncologists do carry their own stocks of medications, but many times it's the hospital that gets stuck providing the chemos the physician has ordered. In those cases, the oncologist doesn't make a dime off the chemo.
Along with chemo medications, there are also medications that help to support the patient. Antiemetics and white cell generating mediations are a major additional cost.
Hospitals are not getting rich off billing for these mediations. All it takes is a few indigent patients and months worth of small profit margins can be eaten up by chemo administration and support services.