Fighting breast cancer compassionately

Marilyn Nagel's memories of her first bout with breast cancer still bother her: Her skin burned from 32 heavy doses of radiation therapy. She developed a painful infection under her arms from blocked glands. Worse yet, Nagel discovered that her physician, a radiation oncologist at the hospital near her home in Minnesota, didn't really care about her health.

"There was no follow-up care, and my doctor didn't want to take any responsibility," Nagel said. "When they diagnosed the infections under my arms, he turned to his assistant and said in front of me, 'That's not our problem.'"

Those words still sting, but that physician's opinion is not Nagel's problem anymore. Today she's receiving the kind of care she expected all along, from Advocate Good Shepherd Hospital's cancer care team. Nagel, a native northwest side Chicagoan, moved to Lake Zurich in 2001. When she needed another lumpectomy, this time in her left breast, Nagel received radiation treatment at the Good Shepherd Outpatient Pavilion. The facility had recently been built with the help of charitable gifts, including two $1 million gifts - one from Vincent and Patricia Foglia of North Barrington and one from the Good Shepherd Hospital Auxiliary. The new pavilion offered Nagel the convenience of having all her appointments in once place only five minutes from her home - and she found the thoughtful care of radiation oncologist James Ruffer, M.D., more to her liking.

"He took plenty of time with me," said Nagel. "In a situation like cancer, you don't think about going to a different doctor, but looking back, I can see the difference in how the doctors treated me. The care I get from all the doctors at Good Shepherd is just unbelievable compared to what I received before."