'My Depression Saved Me' - A Patient Story

When Paula's sudden-onset depression didn't respond to traditional treatment she turned to her Family Medicine physician who'd known her for many years for help. Dr. Cindy Mitch-Gomez looked deeper into her symptoms to reveal a dangerous diagnosis. Watch as Paula takes us through her journey.

[Transcript]

(upbeat music)
["My Depression Saved My Life" - A Patient's Story]

[Paula Levine, Ph.D. Psychologist}

[Paula] I've always been a very positive person, filled with energy and up for just about anything.

[Narrator] As a psychologist, Dr. Paula Levine has treated thousands of patients with depression. But she'd never experienced it first-hand until last year.

[Paula sits in chair in her brightly lit living room, looking out the window]

[Paula] It started with anxiety, major fatigue, some weight loss, I was losing motivation, I was not interested in seeing friends, and I thought this is just not me.

[Narrator] Months of psychotherapy and high doses of medications failed to help, so Paula's family convinced her to consult her longtime family physician.

[Paula prepares a snack at her kitchen counter]

[Paula] She knows me very, very well, which is why my daughters insisted on my seeing her, and she didn't recognize me the first time I walked into her office. I was like a shell of a person, or a shell of the person that she knew.

[Cindy Mitch-Gomez, M.D. Family Medicine Physician, Baptist Health Primary Care]
[Dr. Mitch-Gomez sitting in her office]

[Dr. Mitch-Gomez] I immediately said, "Listen, you know, let's "continue your treatment with the psychologists "and the psychiatrists, "but let's look for something else "because this is so unlike you." and I just couldn't believe that, you know, it was all just a primary depression. So we started doing blood tests, we ordered chest x-rays, we got pelvic ultrasounds, I did CAT scans.

[Paula] And nothing was wrong with my belly but she didn't like what she saw on my left ovary.

[Paula on a yoga mat practicing yoga in her living room.]

[Narrator] Paula's gynecologist scheduled her for a complete hysterectomy. She woke up after surgery to a shocking diagnosis, stage one ovarian cancer.

[Dr. Mitch Gomez] I went to visit her at the hospital that night, it was around eight or nine o'clock, and you know, she had just come out of the anesthesia.

[Paula] She said the most amazing thing, she said, "No wonder you've been so depressed, "this cancer has been sucking the life out of your body."

[Paula speaks with Dr. Beatriz Currier in an examination room at Miami Cancer Institute]

[Narrator] As Paula began chemotherapy treatments, Dr. Mitch referred her to psychiatrist, Dr. Beatriz Currier, of Miami Cancer Institute, an expert in the link between depression and cancer.

[M. Beatriz Currier, M.D. Medical Director, Cancer Patient Support Center, Miami Cancer Institute]

[Dr. Currier] So cancer patients are three times more likely to develop depression within five years of their cancer diagnosis, when compared to the general population. And there is now compelling evidence that the link is systemic inflammation, and in Paula's case, the ovarian cancer had gone undiagnosed for months. There is a release of inflammatory signaling molecules that are called cytokines, can pass into the brain and produce neurochemical changes in the brain to mimic symptoms of depression.

[Paula] Had it not been for the depression, I don't think we would have discovered the cancer.

[Dr. Mitch-Gomez] Listen to the story, you know, just listen to the story and realize, you know, it's really, really important to have somebody who knows you, who understands you, and not only you, but your family history.

[Narrator] Paula has completed her cancer treatment and returned to her normal life.

[Paula smiling and talking on her phone to a grandchild]
[Family photos of Paula, her daughters and her grandchildren]

[Paula] The joys of my life are the joys that I've always had, I have two amazing daughters and five amazing grandchildren, and I love theater of all kinds, I love having my body in motion so I do yoga and Pilates and I swim. Emotionally I am myself, I am totally back to my former pre-depression, pre-cancer, self. And I'm cancer-free, I can't ask for more than that.

[end of transcript]