The director of clinical trials at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, Pennsylvania, has helped thousands of cancer patients as new drugs are tested.During this Women's History Month, Doris Shank was praised as a working warrior for directing cancer trials and taking part in one of them.Her battle against breast cancer has brought her closer to her patients.Shank began her career as a cancer nurse in 1986."We are the hope and the courage for the patient, and we give them strength, and we help them allay their fears because when patients get cancer, it's a horrible diagnosis," she said.It's a diagnosis that's hit her repeatedly.Her husband, Michael, died of lung cancer in 2016. When Shank was diagnosed with endometrial cancer eight months later, she was focused. "I'm just going to pick myself up by my bootstraps, and I'm going to take care of this," she said.After surgery, she was cancer-free. She eventually became director of clinical trials at Hershey Medical Center.Shank said it's a department that works with patients at their most vulnerable. Sometimes, participation takes some convincing."The biggest challenge with clinical trials is the guinea pig mentality because people think that they're guinea pigs because they're being experimented on. We are not experimenting on you," she said.Trials are research studies on drugs awaiting approval by the Food and Drug Administration."Any drug that has treated a cancer patient has originally been studied under a clinical trial, every single one of them," Shank said.She's passionate about clinical trials because it's where amazing strides in medication can be discovered. "How can we make the treatments work better and be less toxic and give our patients a better quality of life," she said.But Shank's life was upended after a routine mammogram showed she had breast cancer."Horrifying, because the first thing I thought was that I was going to die. I was reliving all of my patients' fears," she said.Now a widow and new to the area, Shank leaned on her co-workers for support – including best friend and fellow cancer nurse Kathleen Rizzo."It was the first time I saw it differently for my patients," Rizzo said."If it wasn't for them, I would have had to go through this alone. I have never been alone," Shank said.Shank was enrolled in her own clinical trial: a new protocol to help lessen the side effects of chemotherapy.She worked the entire time. "Some people thought I was crazy, and some people thought I was noble. It depends upon who you talked to and who you asked," she said. "She said, 'This is where my support is. This is where my people are.' So, it was admirable. I don't know if I could have done it," Rizzo said.Now Shank realized how her patients have done it for years."It changes my connection because it puts me in their shoes, and now I have a better understanding when they tell me, 'I can't get out of bed,' why they can't get out of bed," she said.On Monday, Shank will have her final chemo treatment and ring a very special bell to mark the milestone.It's just another connection she will have with the cancer patients she's trying to save."I'm proud that I can set the example," she said. See more about this story in the video player above.