October is awash in seas of pink T-shirts, balloons and ribbons in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. But this messaging fails to recognize people who are not cured of the disease.
Many women with metastatic breast cancer feel left out of annual ‘Pinktober’ awareness drives because these campaigns tend to focus on earlier, more curable stages of the disease.
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A diagnosis of metastatic breast cancer means having cancer for the rest of one’s life – a situation with very different needs and concerns compared to earlier stages of the disease.
A recent Canadian trial reports breast cancer over-diagnosis rates of up to 55 per cent, from routine screening mammograms.
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October is breast cancer awareness month. Women should know there is no reliable evidence that routine mammograms reduce death from breast cancer, and there’s good evidence that they cause harm.
Women with DCIS or stage 0 breast cancer have the same chance of dying from breast cancer as the rest of the population – 3.3%.
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We’re told that finding symptoms of disease early will prevent the more serious consequences. But for pre-cancerous lesions, also known as stage 0 breast cancer, the picture is much more complicated.