Breast Cancer

IT HAS BEEN widely (and with reason) charged that the makers and marketers of silicone breast implants, and self-interested plastic surgeons, made women their guinea pigs. But what of that other, and greater, scourge of women, breast cancer? There is reason to believe that women are equally ill-served by the cancer Establishment, especially in its unrelenting promotion of mammography.Breast cancer now strikes one in nine women, a dramatic increase from the one in 20 in 1950. This year, 180,000 new cases and 46,000 deaths are expected.

The Ward Center at St. Paul's School was in the pink for the American Cancer Society's "With One Voice" celebration to fight breast cancer. There were bunches of pink balloons, pink tablecloths, pink centerpieces and pink roses on the lapels of breast-cancer survivors.Some 125 people gathered for a buffet dinner, including Barbara Little and Jeanne Tsakalos, event committee members; Sam Miller, ACS Mid-Atlantic board president; Dr. Mark J. Brenner and Jacqueline Chambers, board members; Harriet Legum, 1998 One Voice honoree; Charlie Leiss, chief operating officer of ACS Mid-Atlantic division; Dr. William Dooley, director of the Johns Hopkins Breast Center; Ellen McCallum, breast-cancer survivor; and A. Michael Jackson, partner in Greenspring Ventures.

SEATTLE -- Women who don't have a strong family history of breast cancer should not worry about being tested for one of the major breast-cancer genes, University of Washington researchers reported yesterday.In the study, only 2.6 percent of women who already had the disease were found to have a defective BRCA1 gene, linked to breast and ovarian cancer.Statistically, one in eight women in the United States develops breast cancer; experts estimate the disease will kill more than 43,500 this year.

BOSTON -- From time to time, when I hear yet another decision from the health-care honchos of America, a small sentence forms above my head like a balloon in a cartoon: Who Are These People?Do HMOs deliberately recruit their policy-makers from some small subset of Americans who have no -- repeat, no -- experience with illness? Do managed-care headhunters actively search for folks whose primary people-skill is the skill to block out people while focusing on numbers?I burst this balloon publicly after reports that the same managed-care folks that brought us drive-thru deliveries topped that public-relations disaster with a new feat: drive-thru mastectomies.

Women who gain weight in adulthood -- particularly when they LTC are in their 30s -- face an increased risk of breast cancer, Florida researchers have found.Their study of 218 newly diagnosed breast-cancer patients found that more than 63 percent of the women had gained at least 15 pounds since they turned 30, compared to 50 percent of those in a control group of healthy women.More than 48 percent of the breast-cancer patients had gained 15 pounds or more since age 16, compared to 37 percent of the control group, according to the study, published in the current issue of the journal Cancer.

By now, most women are familiar with the benefits of regular exercise in preventing heart disease, strengthening bones, lessening back pain and warding off other chronic diseases. What isn't well-known is something researchers have suspected for years: that exercise plays a strong role in preventing certain types of cancer, including breast cancer.Recent research from the University of Southern California School of Medicine indicates that women who exercise regularly during childbearing years can significantly reduce their risk of developing malignant breast tumors.

Late last year, an international team of researchers forged a breakthrough in the fight against breast cancer, with its discovery of two genes -- BRCA1 and BRCA2 -- that are linked to an inherited form of breast and ovarian cancer.Although for most cancer patients the news will have little direct significance, it is hoped that the discovery of the aberrant genes TC will lead scientists to genes that play a critical role in causing more common forms of the disease. Breast cancer kills 46,000 women each year in the United States alone.

Boston.--So this is what we have been waiting for.When the first ''disease genes'' were identified and a few people had to decide if they wanted to know whether they were doomed by their DNA, ethicists would shake their heads and say, ''If you think these are tough issues, just wait till they find the breast-cancer gene.''When it was first clear that genetic tests could enable employers and insurers to screen for inherited, truly pre-existing, conditions, someone would say, ''Just wait till they find the breast-cancer gene.

Women under age 30 who are diagnosed with breast cancer during pregnancy are more than three times as likely to die from the disease as breast-cancer patients who have never been pregnant, Texas researchers report.The study of 407 women ages 20 to 29 also showed an adverse effect of recent pregnancy on breast-cancer survival.The shorter the time between a pregnancy and a cancer diagnosis, the greater the risk of dying from the disease, researchers from the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Can cer Center in Houston reported in this week's issue of the medical jour nal Lancet.

Decades of government research on breast cancer have done nothing to improve women's odds of surviving or avoiding the disease.Although hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on research since the National Cancer Act declared war against malignancies in 1971, the breast-cancer death rate has increased slightly and prevalence has steadily climbed.A Newsday examination of federal research spending shows a number of factors converged to stymie progress against the disease. Women's health research was a low priority and women were routinely excluded from general health studies.

Question: : I am an anxious person and find that I don't handle stressful situations very well. My doctor prescribed Lexapro, but it made me very nauseated. I woke up in a deep sweat with my heart racing. Are there natural alternatives? Answer: : Lexapro can cause nausea, sweating and palpitations. Drowsiness, headache and sexual difficulties also have been reported. Physicians used to rely on a category of medications called benzodiazepines, which includes drugs like Ativan (lorazepam)

Rabbi Elissa Sachs-Kohen was looking for a way to join the fight against lung cancer. The traditional fundraiser - the 5k run - was out. Sachs-Kohen hates running. Instead, the assistant rabbi at Baltimore Hebrew Congregation and several dozen fellow yoga enthusiasts will be taking to the mats today for what they're calling the Free to Breathe Yogathon. On the first day of Lung Cancer Awareness Month, they plan to earn pledges by performing the sun salutation, a sequence of body positions in hatha yoga.

When Ellen Currotto was diagnosed with breast cancer, when part of her breast was removed, when she endured weeks of chemotherapy and lost her hair, when she underwent radiation, all of these months she focused on just one thing: Being done. They told her she'd get through it, but they didn't tell the retired executive assistant from Granite that after it was over she would still feel so profoundly tired that she couldn't even make it home from a short walk. As women live longer after breast cancer, the health care profession in recent years has begun to validate the concerns of Currotto and the thousands like her who survive the disease but struggle with the realities of the so-called "new normal."

Thirty thousand pairs of sneakers. Thirty thousand pink ribbons. Thirty thousand people trying to beat something. n If nothing else, Sunday's Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure was really 30,000 stories. Tales of people whose lives have been somehow touched by breast cancer. Thousands of reasons for showing up to walk or run on a rainy, cold, dreary morning. n Stories of bravery and pain and love. Of courage and collapse, triumph and loss. n Amanda Brennan's story is about her mom. Debra Sawyer's is about fighting.

Calendar Senior yoga : Classes will be held 10:30 a.m. to noon Thursdays at Slayton House in the Village of Wilde Lake. Sign up for a full session or drop in. Classes are slower-paced and emphasize breathing and stress reduction. Limited space; preregistration recommended. This program is sponsored by the Wilde Lake Community Association. Call 410-730-3987 or e-mail wlevents@columbiavillages.org. Blood donations : The Greater Chesapeake and Potomac Region of the American Red Cross is requesting blood donations.

Seeing pink throughout October makes sisters Cara and Mary Kate Facchina feel fortunate. More than most teenagers, the Mount de Sales tennis players understand the importance of the pink initiatives supported by many high school teams during Breast Cancer Awareness Month to raise money for the cause and emphasize the need for early detection. Had it not been for early detection, their mother, Eileen Facchina, might not be coaching Cara and Mary Kate on the tennis court today. Seven years ago, Eileen Facchina was diagnosed with breast cancer.

When Rhonda Bautista Grenier learned she had breast cancer at age 42, she not only faced a terrifying diagnosis, but the daunting logistics of treatment. How could she tackle a grueling schedule of chemotherapy and radiation, full of painful side effects and hours spent away from three demanding teenagers and a full-time job? Grenier learned of a new clinical trial at Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center that promised to shorten treatment from more than seven months to as a little as seven weeks for women like her who had been diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer.

Kim Wright can dial her friends on a pink phone, dressed in a pink outfit, perhaps embellished with a pink button or two or three. And when she surfs the Internet, most likely searching for more you-know-what, she's doing it on a carnation-colored laptop. When Wright, a breast cancer survivor from Reisterstown, tried to persuade her husband to buy a TV in her signature shade, she perhaps should have worn her sparkly, alluring rose gold necklace with the charm looped into the shape of an advocacy ribbon.

A new study that suggests that racial differences in biology could be a key reason black women are more likely to die of breast cancer than white women has reignited an intense debate among medical experts about the role of genetics versus factors such as poverty, diet and unequal access to quality health care. For nearly three decades, researchers have known about the disparity in death rates, but they have been puzzled over the reasons why. In Maryland, for example, the breast cancer death rate for black women is 15 percent higher than for white women, even though African-Americans have a lower incidence of the disease.

Judith A. Shadrick, a retired bank teller and an outdoorswoman, died of breast cancer July 9 at her Ellicott City home. She was 61. Judith Ann Webster was born in Takoma Park and raised in College Park. She was a 1965 graduate of High Point High School in Beltsville and attended the University of Maryland. Mrs. Shadrick, who worked as a teller at the Columbia Bank branch on Route 40 in Ellicott City, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1993. She was an avid gardener and animal lover, family members said.