Breast Cancer.  It’s a word most of us don’t spend too much time pondering about.  After all, we are busy college students with plenty of other things on our minds and problems to address.  Problems that seem significant or monumental as they occur in our little bubble world of college. Problems like:

“Oh my god, I just gained five pounds.”
“Shoot, I shouldn’t have had that extra slice of pizza last night.”
“Ugh I didn’t make the lacrosse team.”
“Grad school applications need to be in by next week? I am so screwed.”

Thoughts such as these are more of the day-to-day troubles on our minds. But breast cancer? No, not breast cancer.  Unless someone in our family is diagnosed with the disease, why should we think about such an awful, somewhat unthinkable possibility, which is so far removed from our current existence?

Well, I propose we change this lack of breast cancer contemplation. And I have good reasons for it.

Given the explosion of childhood obesity seen in our generation, health experts across the board are predicting crisis proportions of heart disease, diabetes, and you guessed it, breast cancer.  And seeing that we just rounded out National Breast Cancer Awareness month, I think it’s important to point out that the breast cancer Grim Reaper is going to plague our generation unless we take a proactive approach to keeping ourselves healthy and motivating our loved ones to do the same. Read More »

On January 11, 2011, Claudia Gilmore will undergo a preventative double mastectomy with reconstruction. The 23-year old does not have breast cancer, but has a genetic mutation that makes her more likely to develop cancerous cells in the future. She began writing a blog about life with the mutation several months ago. Eventually, the blog became a hot topic in DC, coming up in casual conversation after conversation.

Maureen Dolan-Galvaniz, a local film-maker and classmate of Claudia’s, heard about her previving blog and was fascinated. Wanting to not only tell the story, but spread the word about preventative options, Maureen began working on a documentary about Claudia’s journey to surgery.

Claudia has now appeared in Ladies’ Home Journal, The Today Show, and several other media outlets, spreading the message about previving. We were lucky enough to catch up with the producer/director of the webisodes, Maureen, and get a behind the scenes look into Previve.com and what previving is all about.

How did you first hear about Claudia’s decision to undergo a preventative double mastectomy?
I was out one Saturday evening with girlfriends when they started talking about this Georgetown
girl that was cutting off her breasts and blogging about it! They thought what she was doing was totally crazy – I don’t think either fully understood the BRCA mutations. I had never heard of the BRCA mutation either. I was so intrigued that I started Googling ‘Georgetown girl cuts off breasts’ when I got home. Sure enough, I came across Claudia’s blog. Claudia and I had been colleagues at Georgetown, we had taken our first documentary production class together.

Why do you think Claudia’s story needs to be told?
Because it is incredible and inspiring and touches on so many big ethical health issues. Would you want to know if you had a genetic mutation? What would you do once you found out? Should we test our children? What is life like once you know that you have an increased risk for a deadly disease? Previvors blow my mind. They are some of the most inspiring, joyous people I have ever met. For example, Claudia is so thankful that she knows that she has this genetic mutation that she doesn’t waste any time worrying about what life would be like if she didn’t. She seizes every day and doesn’t dwell on her really unfortunate mutation. Read More »

October is the time to think pink as National Breast Cancer Awareness Month kicks off today.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention an estimated 182,460 new cases of invasive breast cancer are expected to occur among women in the US during 2008; about 1,990 new cases are expected in men.

Aside from skin cancer, breast cancer is the most common cancer in women in the U.S., and is the second most common cause of death among white, black, Asian, and American Indian women. It is the leading cause of death from cancer in Hispanic women.

While most college women don’t need to worry about developing breast cancer at such a young age (we won’t face the invasion of mammograms until our 40s), there’s still plenty we can and should do to protect ourselves. A  major study released in 2006 indicated that the number of new cases of breast cancer dropped significantly in the reporting period of 2002 to 2003. After 20 years of increases, this is incredibly exciting news and most likely directly correlates to new methods of early detection and prevention. Read More »