Breast
cancer has claimed many lives around the word in recent times and
continues to hit hard at many others. These are things you must know
about the disease.
Just a few months before learning that she had breast cancer,
Christina Applegate got a shocking insight into the struggles faced by
other young women also at high risk for the disease — and who don’t have
the resources of a Hollywood celebrity.
Because her mother had battled breast cancer and ovarian cancer,
Applegate had been going for regular mammograms since age 30. “But when I
turned 36, my doctor said that my breasts were just too dense for
mammography alone, and he referred me for screening MRIs at Cedars-Sinai
Medical Center,” she recalls. “After my second MRI, the patient
relations woman who’d been taking care of me for years told me that a
lot of high-risk young women were opting not to have screening MRIs
because they couldn’t afford it — they cost about $3,000 each — and
insurance wouldn’t cover it. It really angered me!”
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) is recommending
sweeping changes in its breast cancer screening guidelines. The USPSTF,
which is a group of independent health experts convened by the
Department of Health and Human Services, reviewed and commissioned
research to develop computer-simulated models comparing the expected
outcomes under different screening scenarios. Here are the USPSTF’s
recommendations, based on all that work: Routine screening of
average-risk women should…
Less than a year later, in 2008, Applegate — who had landed the
starring role in ABC’s comedy seriesSamantha Who? — was diagnosed with
breast cancer — an early-stage cancer caught with the help of those
MRIs. She was barely out of treatment when she began putting together a
new foundation, Right Action for Women (RAW). RAW, an Entertainment
Industry Foundation initiative, has raised money and awareness for
support programs that provide free or low-cost screening MRIs to younger
women who, like Applegate, have a high risk of developing breast cancer
because of significant family histories and cancer-causing genetic
mutations.
This year, approximately 10,000 women younger than 40 will be
diagnosed with breast cancer. What do they need to know about breast
cancer right now? Here’s some advice and info straight from Christina
Applegate and her doctor, Philomena McAndrew, MD, a medical oncologist
with the Tower Hematology/Oncology Group in Los Angeles:
1. Know Your Breasts.
Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in young women
aged 15 to 34. Talk to your doctor about the pros and cons of breast
self-exams. If you choose to do breast self exams, your doctor can
review how to do them with you. (WebMD.com has an online guide; search
“breast self exam.”) If you know how your breasts “should” feel, you’ll
know when there’s a significant change that means you should call your
doctor.
2. Be Persistent.
If you think you feel “something,” and family or doctors dismiss
your concerns because you’re “too young for breast cancer,” it might be
tempting to believe them and not seek further answers. But you have to
be your own advocate, says McAndrew. “The youngest patient I’ve seen was
18 when she felt the mass, and 22 when she was found to have stage IV
breast cancer. She kept telling doctors that she felt something and was
worried about it, but they dismissed it because she was ‘too young.’”
3. Doctor Shop.
Don’t automatically go with the first doctor you see. And yes, you
have time. “Most breast cancers are not like other cancers where you
have to start treatment immediately,” says McAndrew. “You want a
treatment team you’re comfortable with and that is aware of all the
newer approaches, such as genetics, neoadjuvant therapy (chemotherapy
before surgery), and looking at molecular markers of your tumor to
figure out your individual risk.”
4. Research Your Options.
“Learn about things like stage and grade, and what they mean to
your treatment options,” Applegate says. “No question is stupid. Every
question is important.” Good online sources for information, recommended
by Applegate and McAndrew, include breastcancer.org, the Young Survival
Coalition (www.youngsurvival.org), and Facing Our Risk of Cancer
Empowered (FORCE, www.facingourrisk.org), for women at genetically
higher risk of developing cancer.
5. Network with Other Young Women.
“Breast cancer when you’re in your 20s, 30s, and even 40s can be so
isolating,” McAndrew says. “Look online and ask your doctor for
connections with other women your age. Women with breast cancer are
amazing — women who’ve never met are connected by a doctor or a friend,
and they’ll visit each other at home or pick someone up and take them to
chemo. It isn’t a group you’d ever sign up for, but it’s a group that
can make dealing with cancer as a young woman so much less lonely and
difficult.”
Adapted from the October issue of WebMD the Magazine.
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