Three years cancer free, Robin Quivers now uses her voice to raise awareness

Robin Quivers, in Her Third Year of Cancer Remission, Advises the Newly Diagnosed to 'Keep Your Friends Close'

Cancer was the last diagnosis radio personality Robin Quivers expected when she walked into the hospital in May 2012.

“I was tired,” the long-time co-host of Howard Stern‘s radio show told PEOPLE Friday at T.J. Martell Foundation‘s Women of Influence luncheon in New York. “That was the only real symptom.”

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Quivers first realized something was wrong while she was out of town for a friend’s wedding. Instead of attending the wedding, Quivers ended up in the emergency room where doctors told her she had a mass in her pelvis.

“I got back to New York, and it was very hard to diagnose,” she says. “They said I definitely needed surgery, then they finally determined it was some form of cancer but they didn’t know what. In a very short period of time I had to make a lot of life-changing decisions.”

Quivers underwent surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatment for the grapefruit-sized tumor in her uterus.

Now in her third year of remission, Quivers actively advocates for cancer research.

“So many people don’t know what to do and they don’t know where the resources are,” Quivers told PEOPLE. “We can figure out a different way to eradicate this disease, because treatment is sometimes worse than the disease.”

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Quivers, 63, is grateful for the support she received after her diagnosis.

As such, she advises those who have just learned of their diagnosis: “Get your friends around you and keep them close. And get the best medical care you can possibly get.”

And Quivers is taking full advantage of life in remission.