Connecticut Teen Who Fought Cancer Treatment Heading Home From Hospital
HARTFORD, Conn. (CBSNewYork/AP) -- A 17-year-old Connecticut girl forced by the courts to undergo chemotherapy for her cancer has finished that treatment and is expected to be released from the hospital.
The teen, identified in court documents only as Cassandra C., told The Associated Press that she is being released from the Connecticut Children's Medical Center on Monday.
Doctors say her Hodgkin lymphoma, diagnosed in September, is in remission. Cassandra posted photos Friday after having the ports used to administer the chemo removed from her body.
Cassandra and her mother initially refused the treatment, prompting the state Department of Children and Families to step in.
The case went to the state Supreme Court, which ruled in January that Connecticut wasn't violating Cassandra's rights by forcing her to undergo chemotherapy.
The case centered on whether the girl was mature enough to determine how to treat her cancer. Several other states recognize the "mature minor doctrine."
Doctors said the chemotherapy gave her an 85 percent chance of survival, but without it there was a near-certainty of death within two years.
The teen's mother, Jackie Fortin, of Windsor Locks, said they wanted to seek alternative treatment that didn't include putting the "poison" of chemotherapy into her daughter's body.
"She doesn't want toxins in her body," Fortin told CBS2 in January. "She does not want people telling her what to do with her body and how to treat it."
The toxins are "killing her body. They're killing her organs. They're killing her insides," Fortin added.
After Cassandra was diagnosed with high-risk Hodgkin lymphoma, she and her mother missed several appointments, prompting doctors at the hospital to notify the state Department of Children and Families, according to court documents.
The child welfare agency investigated, and a trial court granted the agency temporary custody of Cassandra. Lawyers for Cassandra and her mother then sought an injunction prohibiting medical treatment but were unsuccessful.
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