That didn't seem so certain when her life was turned upside down by a shock diagnosis of uterine cancer back in 2016.

Noticing some bleeding despite having gone through menopause, Ms Purnell took herself to the doctor who noticed thickening in the uterus, but not to a level to be concerned about.

Further tests from a gynecologist resulted in a different diagnosis.

"I had a hysteroscopy (an exam of the inside of the cervix and uterus)," she said. "Ten days after that I got the dreaded phone call of 'come into my office, I have some bad news.'

"Things happened very quickly after that. From when I was diagnosed, it was a week before I had a total hysterectomy."

Ms Purnell also had 15 lymph nodes removed.

She credits the trust of her doctor and her own determination to get further tests as the reasons she's here and healthy today.

Not everyone is so lucky, which is why Ms Purnell is sharing her experiences both with uterine cancer and her treatment with fourth year medical students from the University of Tasmania this week.

"I'm a survivor, but my experience could have been very different if I had not made a choice back in March 2016," she said.

"(Gynecological cancers) are a silent killer.

"We talk about breast cancer openly, but do we ever talk about bowel cancer? Anything down there?

"Anything to do with the vagina is totally out of bounds. ...We need to shine a light on that."

Ms Purnell will be one of three speakers sharing their experiences with gynecological cancers to students, in a first for the university.

Senior lecturer Kathryn Ogden said the university was really pleased to be giving this aspect of care giving and treatment the attention it deserved.

"It's more about the experiences of the women... and raising awareness of the cancers and the presentation of the cancer (than a clinical focus)," Dr Ogden said.

"We were approached by the ANZGOG group who run the (Survivors Teaching Students) program on the mainland.

"It fit very well with the philosophy of equipping doctors with a high level of patient-centered understanding."

Dr Ogden said particularly with the rarity of some gynecological cancers, it often didn't make up a significant portion of students' curriculum, making sessions like this so key.

"Having some awareness of these gynecological cancers, the early symptoms, will improve the care of women.

"But also, there are the more generic skills that will students will develop in understanding the experience of patients.

"It's really crucial that our young doctors... are comfortable having these conversations."