Gratitude and grace: Dave Gast’s 70-year health-care journey with LHSC

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Above: Dave Gast’s health care journey has spanned seven decades, much of it spent in the care of teams at LHSC.

August 15, 2025

In 1955, Louis St. Laurent was Canada’s Prime Minister, a loaf of bread cost about 18 cents and the Detroit Red Wings were the winners of the Stanley Cup.

It was also the year Dave Gast first received care from the hospital that would go on to become London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC), a place he would have a deep connection with over the next 70 years of his life.

Gast, originally from Strathroy, was just 11-years-old when he was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. His parents brought him to London where he would first have surgery followed by more than 20 sessions of Cobalt-60 radiation treatments at Victoria Hospital and War Memorial Children’s Hospital on South Street. Nicknamed the “Cobalt Bomb,” care teams in London were the first in the world to treat patients with the technology in 1951.

“I remember the staff being so supportive and telling me I was very brave,” Gast says of the time he spent in treatment.

Memories of South Street

“I find myself meditating on the lyrics and watching other people worship,” says Gast. “To me that’s a blessing.”

An evolving care journey

Unfortunately, Gast’s first experience with cancer wouldn’t be his last. Decades after his initial diagnosis he would go on to battle skin, lung, prostate and kidney cancers, each time taking his diagnosis in stride.

Gast and his wife Sharon have lived in several communities over the years, but he would receive a great deal of his cancer care at LHSC, undergoing kidney ablation and prostate radiation treatments at the now Verspeeten Family Cancer Centre.

The hospital that helped him as a child was there to support him again as an adult.

Gast experienced a particularly poignant moment after arriving for radiation treatment for prostate cancer in 2010. In the clinic’s waiting room, he spotted several banners depicting the history of the “Cobalt Bomb”. 

“They had a picture of the very machine that treated me. That really brought history alive and made me feel part of it,” says Gast of the full circle moment.  

“I feel strongly connected to LHSC and its history,” he says. 

Gast has also enjoyed seeing the old hospital sites on South Street evolve into the Vision SoHo Alliance affordable housing development. He’s pleased the hospital room windows he once peeked out of as a child will be part of the architecture of a new chapter of community care.  

Gratitude and lessons learned

Gast, who now lives in Kitchener, continues to receive specialized care from the teams at the Verspeeten Family Cancer Centre.

His situation highlights the role LHSC plays in caring for residents across the region.

“LHSC is really critical to the health system that we have here in Ontario,” says Gast. “I think they’re doing a fabulous job.”

He continues to be deeply grateful for the care he’s received throughout his life and has even written two books about his experiences which share stories and lessons he’s learned while navigating his health challenges.

Above all, he credits his steadfast religious faith, medical teams and family for sustaining him through the journey.

“I feel we can walk through these experiences and come out the other end much wiser and with a greater perspective on life,” Gast says.