I have to admit that I have to prompted by reminders to do a breast exam. It’s not something I’m inclined to do on my own.
At my workplace, we just had a memorial luncheon in honor of a coworker who recently died from pancreatic cancer. It was really sad. We were given purple awareness bracelets and someone from a local advocacy group stood up and talked about the fundraising they do. My awareness was raised…but I’m not sure what to do with it. I mean, if I find a lump in my breast, I know I need to take my ass to the doctor. But you can’t do that with your pancreas. Really the only message I took away from that lady’s talk was “If you feel sick, go to the doctor! And hope that the doctor will know what to look for!”
People like knowing that they can be “proactive”. You get that feeling with breast cancer, but not with other cancers.
I guess it depends on what you call the “prime” of life but most breast cancer occurs in women over 60 and only 10 - 15% for women under 45.
Personally I’d prefer that funding and awareness go to childhood cancers. Children have not yet been able to experience life and should be able to do so without their childhood being stolen by chemo treatments and living in a hospital.
I know a woman in her 40s who is battling with it right now, and another one in her 40s who is in remission. No matter what the statistics indicate, I can’t help but associate breast cancer with women in the prime of their lives.
My father’s sister had breast cancer when she was 29; my mother’s sister had it in her early 40s and in her late 50s, 15 years apart (unrelated types).
I agree that living in a hospital and undergoing a couple years of treatment is pretty awful, but I’m old enough to remember when the more typical result of “your child has cancer” was burying said child in a short time period rather than a decent chance at remission and a quality life afterward. THAT was a good use of research funds, even if the treatment isn’t perfect. While not all childhood cancers have a good success rate for treatment quite a few do now. In particular, acute lymphoblastic leukemia and non-Hodgkin lymphoma have very high survival rates at the five year mark (90% and 85%) with many child survivors living well into adulthood. It’s not “stealing” a kid’s childhood if by giving them a couple years of admittedly harsh medical treatment you give them chance to actually live a lifetime rather than being in the ground in a small coffin. Several other childhood cancers have long term survival rates in the 70% range. Still scary if your kid is diagnosed, but no longer an automatic death sentence.
According to several sources on line, only 5 percent of breast cancers in women occur in women under 40. Of course, in absolute numbers 5 percent of any nation’s population is going to be a significant number of people and we’ll all know people in that group. The median age of initial diagnosis of breast cancer in the US is 61 in women, 68 in men, which would indicate that most of them occurring late in life are not repeats.
Around here I see very few “non-corporate” breast cancer campaigns. Breast cancer advocates have done a great job of moving the effort onto Yoplait yogurt and pink baseball bats in the MLB. There is the Komen walk.
The Juvenile Diabetes walk gathers almost as many people and as much support and there are billboards up for the Children’s Cancer Research fund. Relay for Life for the American Cancer Society is huge around here - my daughter has spent about ten hours already raising money and will spend all night walking for pledges - rain or shine - in May - her team has already raised about $3000 - not bad for a bunch of tenth graders. There are billboards up all over encouraging people to get colon cancer screenings (scopes are even less fun than mammograms).
On the breast cancer front there are a few things going to awareness. One, I think for women of a certain age (I’m that age as well) we remember when such things were not talked about. For those people, getting rid of the stigma is a big deal. Two, breast cancer does seem to touch a lot of lives. My sister had a double mastectomy, my cousin a single, my aunt a lumpectomy (and we don’t have the gene). A friend had a lumpectomy, another died. My sister was under 40. My cousin and friends both under 50. Now, I’ve also lost a brother in law to bladder cancer and a grandmother to lung cancer (but she was 80 and had been a multi pack a day smoker since 15). those are the “non friends of friends on facebook” - the people I saw with their hair gone or went to their funerals. The last thing is that right now we are seeing some attention on breast cancer because Planned Parenthood is once again under attack and does offer mammograms, which is once again drawing attention to breast cancer having a larger public awareness effort than other kinds of cancer. Want colon cancer to get some attention - have the Church of Satan start offering free screenings.
I had a similar thought last month, when so many guys participated in No-Shave-November, or Movember. How many of those mustachioed men even knew the purpose was to raise awareness for prostate cancer? How much awareness was raised? How much did the state of prostate cancer research or treatment improve?
When the NFL goes pink for a month, at least everyone knows it’s for breast cancer awareness. I have my doubts about how much real benefit there is to the research or treatment of the disease.
As the OP said, awareness means nothing, everybody know and will know and you only need 1% of the money for that.
Breast cancer research has basically done nothing in 20 or 30 years.
Self-examination simply does not save lives and may do more damage all in all. Mammograms might save a very, very small number of lives while wrecking many other women’s lives with overdiagnosis. If you take away these two, what’s left? Generic health advice of eating well and doing excercise. Without them, there’s nothing else in the “awareness”.
Of course “nothing is stopping you from blah blah blah” but going against the social pressure of “breast cancer rulz” is hard.
Children having cancer or any disease is horribly wrong and unfair, but your comment is an insensitive slap in the face to many of us who are beyond childhood and have survived cancer (so far). Really what I want to say would get me a stern warning. What you’ve said is that insulting to me.
My theory is simple: everyone likes breasts. If you’re a cookie manufacturer, putting a pink ribbon on your packaging is a nice little reminder of both charity and breasts, and breasts just plain sell better than pancreases, colons, brains and prostates.
Which is not to say that research and awareness isn’t important, but I do lean towards the OP’s feeling that we should probably spread the wealth to include some less exciting body parts.
“Substantial support for breast cancer awareness and research funding has helped improve the screening and diagnosis and advances in the treatment of breast cancer. Breast cancer survival rates have increased, and the number of deaths steadily has been declining, which is largely due to a number of factors such as earlier detection, a new personalized approach to treatment and a better understanding of the disease.”
“The outlook for patients diagnosed with breast cancer has been changing for the better over time, with several significant advances coming through in the past 10 years. Along with more-effective therapies with fewer side effects than traditional treatment, a greater understanding of risk and accessible preventive measures has given women everyday tools to protect themselves against the disease.
Five particular advances have made a notable impact on the lives of breast cancer patients during the past 10 years. These include HER2-directed therapies, gene expression testing, hormonal therapy, less-invasive surgery, and healthy lifestyle choices aimed at prevention.”
*"People suffering from some of the most common forms of cancer are twice as likely to survive for at least 10 years, compared with patients diagnosed in the early 1970s, research showed today.
Breast, bowel and prostate cancer survival rates have shot up, as have those for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and leukemia…
The percentage of women likely to survive breast cancer for at least 10 years has jumped from less than 40% to 77%, while the figure for both sexes for bowel cancer has risen from 23% to 50%."*
Author and BCS Barbara Ehrenreich has spoken out about this; when she was diagnosed, she was given what amounted to a souvenir catalog, and she thought the “Breast Cancer Bear” was pretty much the most demeaning thing she ever saw.
One of the problems with statistics is that they can tell you what you want.
A lot of the increase in cancer survival comes from early detection, that’s right, but no in the way you’d think. Most of these women will die at the same age as if they’d had the cancer detected later, they simply know they have cancer for a longer time.
Overdiagnosing and overtreatment are rampant in breast cancer (particularly Stage 0).
Rhis is a good article. I have one much better, but I’ve lost it.
A better onehttp://www.cochrane.org/CD001877/BREASTCA_screening-for-breast-cancer-with-mammography
“If we assume that screening reduces breast cancer mortality by 15% and that overdiagnosis and overtreatment is at 30%, it means that for every 2000 women invited for screening throughout 10 years, one will avoid dying of breast cancer and 10 healthy women, who would not have been diagnosed if there had not been screening, will be treated unnecessarily. Furthermore, more than 200 women will experience important psychological distress including anxiety and uncertainty for years because of false positive findings. To help ensure that the women are fully informed before they decide whether or not to attend screening, we have written an evidence-based leaflet for lay people that is available in several languages on www.cochrane.dk. Because of substantial advances in treatment and greater breast cancer awareness since the trials were carried out, it is likely that the absolute effect of screening today is smaller than in the trials. Recent observational studies show more overdiagnosis than in the trials and very little or no reduction in the incidence of advanced cancers with screening.”