The Big Bang Theory‘s Kate Micucci recently revealed that she was diagnosed with lung cancer. This past Saturday, the 43-year-old actress and comedian who played Lucy on CBS’s popular sitcom uploaded a video to TikTok in which she revealed she had been diagnosed with cancer after undergoing surgery to remove the disease from her body.
“Hey everybody, this is not a TikTok, it’s a ‘Sick Tok,’” she said. “I’m in the hospital but it’s because I had lung cancer surgery yesterday. They caught it really early.”
Videos by PopCulture.com
“It’s really weird, because I’ve never smoked a cigarette in my life so uh, you know, it was a surprise,” Micucci said. “But also I guess, also, it happens and so the greatest news is they caught it early, they got it out, I’m all good.”
Lung cancer is among the most deadly cancers in the United States, accounting for about 1 in 5 of all cancer deaths. While smoking is the most common cause of lung cancer, it is not uncommon for someone without a history of smoking to be diagnosed with lung cancer.
Non-smokers can contract lung cancer from radon, secondhand smoke, air pollution, or other factors, says the American Cancer Society. A lung cancer diagnosis at an early stage has a 70 percent chance of surviving for at least five years. In the event that lung cancer has spread to other parts of the body, however, the chances of living long-term drop as low as 5 percent.
“It’s been a little bit of a trip and [I’ll] probably be moving slow for a few weeks but then I’ll be back at it,” Micucci said, adding that she is looking forward to painting again. “Why am I still talking … ’cause I’m on drugs!” she joked, giving a thumbs up.
Additionally, Micucci included a video in her post of her slowly pacing along the hospital corridors in her gown while wheeling along an IV drip. One fan asked in the comments section if she had any symptoms that prompted her to seek medical attention.
“I had one thing in my bloodwork that came back really high,” she said, explaining that she had high levels of CRP, which meant that there was a lot of inflammation in her body. “So I went to a preventative doc who did a few scans. He scanned my heart and that’s where the spot in my lung was noticed.”
