Danielle Spencer, who was most known for playing Dee Thomas, on the sitcom What’s Happening!! has died aged 60. According to one of her co-stars, who spoke to The Hollywood Reporter, Spencer died on Monday in a hospital in Richmond, Virginia. “She suffered for a very long time but did it with a great deal of courage,” Haywood Nelson told the publication. Spencer was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy in 2014. Four years later, she underwent emergency brain surgery to remove a bleeding hematoma that was left undiscovered from a car accident back in 1976. The devastating incident happened during What’s Happening’s second season and left her stepfather Tim Pelt dead and left Spencer in a coma for several weeks. At the time, she underwent six months of physical therapy after the crash that left her with a broken arm, leg and pelvis. She underwent six months of physical therapy after the crash that left her with a broken arm, leg and pelvis

It was announced this week that Spencer had died in hospital, however a cause of death is yet to be shared. Her former co-star Haywood led tributes on Instagram, writing: “Dr. Dee, our brilliant, loving, positive, pragmatic warrior, without fail, has finally found her release from the clutches of this world and a body. We celebrate Danielle Spencer and her contributions as we regret to inform her departure and transition from a long battle with cancer.”

He added: “We have lost a daughter, sister, family member, What’s Happening!! cast member, veterinarian, animal rights proponent and healer, and cancer heroine. Our Shero. Danielle is loved. She will be missed in this form and forever embraced.”

Born in the Bronx, New York, in 1965, Spencer began acting classes aged seven and was cast in What’s Happening!! four years later.

However a year after the show began, the actress was involved in the shocking car accident.

She later developed a spinal condition that left her paralysed from the waist down for months. After the series was cancelled in 1979, Spencer and her mother temporarily relocated to Africa.

She briefly returned to the small screen as Dee for the sequel of What’s Happening Now!!

After the spin-off was cancelled in 1988, she then attended Tuskegee University Veterinary School in Tuskegee, Alabama, becoming a veterinarian in 1993.

While she eventually stepped away from television Spencer did play a vet in the 1997 film As Good as It Gets and appeared in Peter Rabbit and the Crucifix in 2001.

She also released a book about her life as a child star titled Through the Fire: Journal of a Child Star in 2011.