Chemotherapy

Maugansville Ruritan Club will hold its annual community auction Saturday, March 19, beginning at 3 p.m.   The club will donate 75 percent of the proceeds to Tracy McKinsey, a resident of Maugansville and a physical education teacher at Maugansville Elementary School. Tracy was diagnosed with leukemia in August 2010 and has been undergoing chemotherapy. She had a bone marrow transplant in February.   If anyone would like to donate a new or like-new item to be auctioned, drop the items off at the Ruritan Club anytime on Friday, March 18, or on the day of the sale.

bonnieb@herald-mail.com CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. - On June 30, Donna Nordin of Fayetteville, Pa., was diagnosed with breast cancer. Her course of treatment, called neo-adjuvant, is fairly new, and involves taking chemotherapy before having surgery, she said. "Some women have it to help them avoid surgery," Nordin said, although she already knows she will need a mastectomy. But doing the chemo first still has its advantages. "It makes it less likely that the surgery will cause the cancer to spread," she said.

chambersburg@herald-mail.com CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. - Being diagnosed with cancer is no laughing matter, but it is no reason to stop laughing, according to someone who knows, cancer survivor and author Lynn Eib. Eib, the author of "When God and Cancer Meet," read some curious entries from patient charts during a speech she gave Sunday at the annual National Cancer Survivors' Day luncheon at King Street United Brethren Church. "The patient has pain if lying on her side for more than a year," one doctor wrote.

The second annual "Purse-on to Person" Fighting Breast Cancer Auction was Sunday at Sheraton Four Points on Dual Highway in Hagerstown. More than 420 people packed the hotel's ballroom, ate dinner and raised more than $50,000 as hundreds of donated purses and gift items were auctioned. Breast Cancer Awareness of the Cumberland Valley organized the event. Sponsoring the auction was the Alpha Sigma Chapter of the Epsilon Sigma Alpha sorority. More than $50,000 was raised during the event, according to Joan Fell, executive director of Breast Cancer Awareness of the Cumberland Valley.

A 5-year-old Hagerstown boy who was diagnosed with brain cancer in June 2008 and became the focus of local fundraisers died Tuesday at Meritus Medical Center. Corey Matthew Kitchen, who was under the care of the Hospice of Washington County, had malignant brain tumors in 2008, according to The Herald-Mail’s archives. The tumors were detected at Washington County Hospital, now Meritus Medical Center, and Corey was referred to Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., his mother, Angelina Kitchen, said Wednesday afternoon.

HALFWAY - In July 2003, Joe Dill thought he'd be dead within a year. He prepaid for his funeral package, wrote his obituary and organized his belongings. Dill had been diagnosed in March 2003 with diffuse scleroderma - an autoimmune disease with no known cause or cure - and was about to embark as a test subject for a stem cell transplant with chemotherapy treatment. He didn't know whether it would help him or kill him. Three years later, Dill, 62, is still living with the effects of scleroderma, but he no longer has any diseased scleroderma cells and is living an active life in Halfway, volunteering for Big Brothers Big Sisters, swimming, fishing and visiting friends and family.

She hoped she had it beat. McKenzie McCarter, 9, of Hagerstown, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia in September 2007. After 2 1/2 years of chemotherapy at Children's National Medical Center in Washington D.C., she was in remission. Her mother, Melissa McCarter, said life was great. “She got healthy. She was in sports,” McCarter said. Then this past May, bad news struck again. McKenzie, known by those close to her as Kenzie, had relapsed. This time, the treatment plan would include not only chemotherapy, but additional chemo and radiation.

Franklin County Commissioner Robert L. "Bob" Thomas, who has been a commissioner since 1995, announced Friday that he will be able to continue serving in the post even as he undergoes treatment for the blood and bone marrow disease myelodysplastic syndrome. He made the announcement Friday in the commissioners meeting room, in the presence of his wife, Sherryl, daugthers Bobbie and Kelly, other family members, friends and fellow Commissioners David Keller and Bob Ziobrowski. Thomas said he will spend much of the next two to three months undergoing treatment, including a bone marrow transplant, at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A first-of-a-kind prostate cancer treatment that uses the body's immune system to fight the disease received federal approval Thursday, offering an important alternative to more intensive treatments like chemotherapy. Dendreon Corp.'s Provenge vaccine trains the immune system to fight tumors. It's called a "vaccine" even though it treats disease rather than prevents it. Doctors have been trying to develop such a therapy for decades, and Provenge is the first to win approval from the Food and Drug Administration.

Jana Lyn Russell, 36, of Hagerstown, Md., and Edina, Minn., died Monday, March 4, 2013, peacefully at home surrounded by family. A precious child, Jana was the light of her family and many extended friends. At the age of 2, she was diagnosed with a tumor on her brain stem and bravely withstood surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation treatments. Despite the challenges brought on by surviving childhood cancer, Jana was ever-present with her mother in the ballet studio, in her leotard and at the barre, reminding us all that life is to be lived fully and without regrets.