It was mid-July six years ago when breast cancer appeared in Rachel’s life, although who took him inside was not her, but her mother.
There were only a few days left for an operation without a mastectomy in which the tumor would be removed along with the chain of axillary ganglia on the tumor side.
Everything was already planned by his mother, who was keeping the secret since May “once accepted the diagnosis and what is happening, then it is managed to whom you tell him,” explains Purification, who prefers not to give his full name, since
Not all relatives know their struggle and most importantly, their victory.
Because after four sessions of chemo, radio, 18 shots of an injectable compound and a medication that still is still taking, has won the battle to HER2 positive, “since the first step before facing it is to know their surnames”,
Purification points out.
As this victory there are many others every year in Spain, women surviving a cancer with more than 26,000 diagnostics per year and 1.4 million new cases in the world at each lap that gives Earth to the sun.
Raquel has lived close, very close, from the person who brought it to this world, and this made it take much more awareness about the importance of early diagnosis.
“I had never made an exploration, nor had it allowed me to think a lot about the disease before having it nearby, do you think that it affects much older people and that it is not so habitual”, underlines the daughter of purification.
“I have to confess that I made my first mammary ultrasound when my mother put her in treatment and although she was trembling, seeing all the control they were having with her, she gave me tranquility and optimism,” she adds.
Mother and daughter do not separate from your rose bracelets, a color with even more meaning on October 19, World Breast Cancer Day, the perfect moment to influence the importance of early detection and prevention in young women.
This type of cancer is often asymptomatic and is usually diagnosed through a routine mammogram or through physical examination, so going to periodic reviews with the health professional is key.
Although it is necessary to emphasize that when talking about a general population, mammography screening is made from 45 or 50 years – depending on the autonomous community.
“These age recommendations are based on the trials that were performed on their early mammographic detection day,” explains Álvaro Rodríguez-Lescure, president of SEOM (Spanish Society of Medical Oncology).
He also points out that, in the case of young women, mammogram is not a particularly effective test, since the younger, the breast is more glandular, that is, more dense.
“It’s in that strip-than from 45 or 50 years – in which a certain utility has been demonstrated,” says Rodríguez-Lescure.
As the President of SEOM explains, mammary self-exploration is only recommended in women who have already suffered a breast cancer.
“No study has shown that it is useful for changing mortality due to this type of disease in the general population,” he insists.
To prevent, Rodríguez-Lescure states that a healthy diet, a physical exercise on a regular basis and avoiding toxic as alcohol and tobacco, if decreasing both the incidence of this type of cancer and others.
There are also other factors such as hormonal that is related to the reproductive life of women, as the number of pregnancies, but especially the age at which they occur.
“A pregnancy at an early age has a protection effect, having a child at a late age or not having it, increases risk,” Specifies Rodríguez-Lescure.
By depending on this other factors such as socioeconomic, diet and exercise are postulated as the best prevention.
The carelessness that sometimes accompanies youth is something that also passed Paqui Aguilar, President of Asamma, the Association of Women Operated Breast Cancer, belonging to Fecma (Spanish Federation of Breast Cancer).
“34 years ago I was 33, I was very young and I could not imagine that I could have breast cancer because then there was not so much information as now, I had a bump that turned out to be cancer, but at that time it was like taboo, at no time did you mean?
To the disease like cancer, “says Aguilar.
Although previously, breast cancer was studied as a single disease, it has been discovered that there are actually many different subtypes with their own treatment.
The study of tumor cells has allowed them to catalog them in three types, as specified or not specific receivers: hormonal tumors (luminal A or B), which would be 70% of cases, HER2 positive – in 15% – and
The negative triple – also by 15% -.
Like knowledge progresses, it does the information that is offered to the general population with the purpose of reducing mortality in this type of cancer.
Campaigns such as ‘do it for you’ that carries out Roche with the collaboration of other organizations such as SEOM or Fecma, aims to sensitize and raise awareness of the young public, women between 20 and 45 years, on the importance of prevention
of breast cancer, positively and hopefully.
Emphasizing healthy living habits, not hesitating in consulting with your primary care physician or specialist and the importance of going to periodic gynecological reviews.
A trick with which women count today, but not in the year in which the President of Asamma was diagnosed.
In that time there was either as such the association and as main support he had his two daughters and the couple of it.
Nowadays, groups like this have specialists and psychologists to accompany the women diagnosed at all times.
As important as the treatment itself, it is optimism “I thought that I was not going to see my daughters grow and I’m already watching my granddaughter,” says Aguilar.
Since the association itself pushes women to stay active and not be overwhelmed by passivity.
The Seven Women and Today’s Association began, there are more than 1,500 registered women, many of them young volunteers who come to hospitals to visit women who are newly operated.
The most veteran, like Aguilar, look back and highlight how much everything surrounds this disease has changed.
Now you have more information, both on the part of oncologists and society itself.
“The early detection campaigns are saving many lives, because we know that breast cancer, if it is detected in time, can be cured,” says Aguilar.
From associations they develop an important role, they are coordinated with professionals who, in turn, speak of associations or groups like this to women who are in treatment, to accompany them.
“There is still some way forward to walking, but for that we are associations and professionals, to walk together,” says Asamma President.
