The speaker believes the current healthcare system fails cancer patients upon recurrence by creating significant delays in treatment and requiring patients to be their own aggressive advocates.

“it seems that we have a really good system as I experienced when someone is diagnosed with cancer they get a health net a cancer navigator you know they get all these things and we're boom boom boom boom boom but when that cancer comes back it's kind of like the system seems to give up on you”

She contends that the struggle for many patients starts with a long period of being misdiagnosed and not believed by medical professionals.

“For so many people, the struggle does not begin with a diagnosis. It often begins with months and months of misdiagnosis and the struggle to be believed.”