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home / 世界杯决赛2022

'you don't expect it's going to happen to you': edmonton family grapples with rare cervical cancer

in alberta, anyone with a cervix — including women and some non-binary people and transgender men — are recommended to have a pap test starting at age 25, or three years after becoming sexually active, whichever is later

by madeline smith
published feb 12, 2023
read time 3 minute read
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read time 3 minute read
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shelbi and nelson wiebe with their son marshall. supplied / 00099647a
a young edmonton family is trying to raise community support and awareness while they cope with a rare type of cervical cancer. shelbi wiebe, 31, learned she had cervical cancer in the fall of 2021, just a few months after giving birth to her son marshall.
while the prospect of cancer treatment while caring for a newborn was already devastating, tests showed wiebe also had a rare, fast-growing disease called mixed neuroendocrine small cell cervical cancer.
after a radical hysterectomy, the plan was to follow up with chemotherapy and radiation, but when wiebe started chemo, she developed a blood clot in her lungs that almost killed her. at that point, she said because the risks of continuing the treatment were too high, the hope was that surgery had removed all the cancer.
instead, after discovering further spread a few months later, wiebe had more chemotherapy and radiation, suffering more pain and new complications with one of her kidneys.
as that treatment finished, subsequent scans have shown the cancer isn’t gone, and wiebe said she’s been told there aren’t other treatment options that doctors believe will be effective.
“there kept being more and more things to my case that they just had never seen,” she said.
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wiebe and her husband nelson wiebe have now launched an online fundraiser to help with the cost of treatment at a private clinic in the u.s., where they’re hoping to try immunotherapy or chemotherapy that more specifically targets her tumours, and that they haven’t been able to access locally.
“i think i’ve said it so often, but it’s true — you don’t expect it’s going to happen to you,” shelbi wiebe said.

work underway for more cervical cancer prevention

pap tests, the standard screening tool for cervical cancer, are incredibly effective — according to alberta health services, regular tests and followup can prevent about 90 per cent of cervical cancers. but there’s also work being done to help prevent more rare cases like wiebe’s.
in alberta, anyone with a cervix — including women and some non-binary people and transgender men — are recommended to have a pap test starting at age 25, or three years after becoming sexually active, whichever is later.
wiebe said none of the regular pap tests she had in her 20s showed any cause for concern. but the cancer she has doesn’t follow the typical pattern.
dr. catherine popadiuk, the chairwoman of the canadian foundation for women’s health, said that the more common types of cervical cancer can take years to progress from precancerous cells, and doctors can intervene early after spotting an abnormal result on a pap test.
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“whereas for these aggressive cancers, they grow out of nowhere. they just happen and we don’t know why.”
dr. huiming yang, the director of screening programs at ahs, said alberta is also looking at implementing primary human papillomavirus (hpv) testing as another tool to combat cervical cancer.
almost all cases of cervical cancer are caused by hpv, but infections are incredibly common and most people don’t know they have it. it only becomes an issue if the infection lingers and develops into pre-cancer, which in most cases pap tests will catch.
“by switching to primary hpv testing — i expect that will happen in a few years — and when that happens i think we can prevent even more (cases) just from screening,” yang said.
alberta rolled out hpv vaccinations for girls in grade 5 and grade 9 starting in 2008, and it’s now available in schools for grade 6 students, regardless of gender. the vaccines are a proven prevention tool for hpv-related cancers, and ideally, it’s best to get vaccinated before becoming sexually active, but adults can also ask a health provider about getting the shots.
yang said combining that broad preventative measure with screening offers hope “to eliminate cervical cancer to a really rare cancer.”
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for wiebe, after what she’s been through, she wants other women to know to advocate for themselves and their health.
“i’ve been telling any woman that’s close to me, “go and ask questions.'”
masmith@postmedia.com
@meksmith

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