Nurse Dalton Cummins can truly relate to his oncology patients at Riley Hospital for Children. After all, he was once a patient there himself, battling two different forms of cancer and coming close to death more than once.
Cummins, now 24, was first diagnosed with lymphoma at age 19 after what he initially thought was a case of COVID-19. He underwent successful treatment at the Indianapolis children’s hospital,
only to be struck again a few months later with a different form of the disease.
Now recovered, Cummins is back in the cancer unit but instead of lying in a bed hooked up to tubes and monitors, he is the one tending to young children, some of whom might be reluctant to take their medicines, just as he once was.
“I always try to figure out the underlying reason and connect with them a bit,” Cummins tells PEOPLE. “Then I can use that to help other people.”
Dalton Cummins.
Mike Dickbernd
Cummins knows firsthand how terrifying a cancer diagnosis can be.
When he was a freshman at a community college in May 2020, it was only a few months into the COVID-19 pandemic and he began coughing frequently and spitting up clear mucus. When the cough would not go away after a few weeks, Cummins went to the doctor, suspecting he had a case of the new disease going around.
Instead he was diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma.
“I went upstairs and started crying,” he says. “I was definitely scared.”
Dalton Cummins.
Mike Dickbernd
He underwent months of chemotherapy but about four months into it, he spiked a high temperature, felt ice cold and was experiencing symptoms of septic shock, he said, so he went to the emergency department. He was quickly admitted for 25 days to Riley’s Pediatric Intensive Care Unit with a 10 percent chance of survival, according to his doctors.
“They really didn’t think I was going to make it,” Cummins says, so much so that his family was called in to spend what might have been their last moments together.
But he beat the odds and improved enough to return to the regular oncology unit, where he finished treatment.
Cummins thought his ordeal was over but just three months later, he endured another blow when he was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma.
“When my doctor told me she was hugging me and crying,” he says. “I was like, this is not good. I walked out of the hospital and I just lost it.”
Dalton Cummins.
Mike Dickbernd
This time he underwent three months of chemo, then received a stem cell transplant in May of 2021, followed by radiation and then a year of maintenance chemo.
Meanwhile, Cummins managed to finish college with an associate’s degree in nursing, a profession he was drawn to through his own experience. “I thought, this is something I can connect with,” he says.
Dalton Cummins.
Mike Dickbernd
When it was time to decide where he wanted to work in May, it was an easy choice. “I felt a connection to every single person,” he says.
Now when he’s on the floor taking a patient’s vital signs, hanging chemo bags, accessing medical ports and performing other nursing duties, he also provides a sense of relief and comfort to some of the children and parents, he says.
Since “I’ve had almost every type of treatment for cancer,” he’ll answer as many questions as he can and serves as a relatable example of someone who has undergone many of the same challenges as his patients.
Says Cummins, ”Being able to brighten them up even when it’s a hard time is something I love doing.”
