Ivanka, Croatia

We all deserve a life! The diagnosis does not define me!

I am a person who has been treated for two different cancers and a medical professional in the healthcare system. My personal experience of cancer treatment encouraged me to specialize in the field of wounds, stomas and incontinence, improving outcomes in cancer treatment. Immediately after treatment, I initiated activities in my hospital in Croatia and after years of initiative I went to neighboring Ljubljana and completed special education in these areas. Today, I have been working in the Republic of Croatia for 10 years as a specialist in wounds, stomas and incontinence and we have implemented international guidelines in our daily work with oncology patients in order to improve the care of oncology patients. We have managed to initiate another 50 nurses in Croatia who also specialize in these important areas that we often find to be a big problem in oncology and palliative care. I am very proud of all of us. I am also very proud of my family, my three sons who I had the opportunity to watch grow up into successful young people, because I survived cancer and got a big part of my life back. I also wanted to provide the same to other patients, especially children, and I believe that through my daily work in oncology, I manage to improve treatment outcomes and reduce the suffering of patients and their families.