NNLM Network of the National Library of Medicine

Research

Studies have shown that your risk for breast cancer is due to a combination of factors, but the main factors that influence your risk include being a woman and getting older. Most breast cancers are found in women who are 50 years old or older. Yet, some women, and men, will get breast cancer even without any other risk factors that they know of. However, having a risk factor does not mean you will get the disease, and not all risk factors have the same effect. If you have breast cancer risk factors, talk with your doctor about ways you can lower your risk and about screening for breast cancer. What are the Risk Factors for Cancer? (CDC)

National Institutes of Health is a leader in medical discoveries

Although cancer has plagued the world for the entirety of human history, it was not until the early 1900s that people came together to create prominent cancer advocacy associations worldwide and to develop national cancer legislation in the United States. In March of 1930, the Senate Commerce Committee heard the testimony of leading cancer researchers, advocates, and other cancer specialists. They told stories of cancer incidence in the United States, explained possible cures, and expressed the need for a national clinic. Since then, multiple legislative acts and amendments have broadened the role of the National Cancer Institute in supporting and improving cancer research. Breast Cancer—Patient Version

Medical discoveries advance health and wellness

Diversity in medicine and science helps inform our understanding of health and wellness for all races, ethnicities, and genders, so it's important that everyone has the opportunity to participate. How do we raise awareness, support and education to include everyone in breast cancer research?

Joyce Brown (she/her) was born and raised in Chicago. She is now retired after a career working in a nursing home, in retail, and most recently as a church secretary. Joyce is a survivor of breast cancer, which she discovered in her body through a routine mammogram. Since becoming cancer free three years ago, she has taken it upon herself to do all she can for other patients and survivors. Joyce serves on multiple breast cancer task forces and survivor groups and spends much time in the community raising awareness about disparities and educating community members about preventive and other resources. She says she never wants women to feel alone and helpless.

"In the U.S. today, a Black woman is about 40 percent more likely to die from breast cancer than a white woman."

Komen’s Health Equity Initiative initially targets 10 U.S. cities where disparities in late-stage breast cancer diagnoses and mortality are the greatest. The goal is to reduce the mortality gap by 25 percent in the areas where inequities are the greatest. (August 2, 2021)

African American Breast Cancer Alliance, Inc. (AABCA) was founded in October 1990 for awareness, networking, resources and support for Black women and men impacted by breast cancer.

TOUCH, the Black Breast Cancer Alliance drives the collaborative efforts of patients, survivors, advocates, advocacy organizations, health care professionals, researchers and pharmaceutical companies to work collectively, with accountability, towards the common goal of eradicating Black Breast Cancer.

Redes En Acción is dedicated to reducing Latino cancer with a national network of community groups, researchers, government health agencies and the public. Core activities include research, training, and stimulating awareness of cancer and resources in Latino communities.

The American Cancer Society (ACS) in its effort to raise awareness of Advancing Health Equity – Addressing Cancer Disparities created a short video and discussion guide about breast cancer.

Book

From the mammogram that would change her life through her diagnosis, treatment, and recovery, New York Times bestselling author Theresa Brown, RN, tells a poignant and powerful story about having breast cancer in her book, Healing: When a Nurse Becomes a Patient. Despite her training and years of experience as a cancer and hospice nurse, Brown finds it difficult to navigate the medical maze from the other side of the bed. She relays the unforgettable details of her daily life—the needles, the chemo drugs, the rubber gloves, the bureaucratic frustrations—but this time from her new perch as a patient, looking back at some of her own cases and considering what she didn’t know then about the warping effects of fear and the healing virtues of compassion.

Healing: When a Nurse Becomes a Patient | Theresa Brown | Workman Press | 2022 | 272 pages | ISBN: 978-1643750699 | WorldCat |

Author

Theresa Brown, PhD, BSN, RN, is a nurse and writer who lives in Pittsburgh. She lectures nationally and internationally on issues related to nursing, health care, and end of life. Theresa has been a frequent contributor to the New York Times and her writing has appeared on CNN.com, and in The American Journal of Nursing, The Journal of the American Medical Association, and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Theresa has been a guest on MSNBC Live and NPR’s Fresh Air.

Contact Theresa Brown if your book club chooses to read and discuss Healing. She is willing to Zoom into your book group, and she will also send you personalized bookplates, one for each member of your group.

Official Website of Theresa Brown

Interview

Book

A week after her forty-first birthday, the acclaimed poet Anne Boyer was diagnosed with highly aggressive triple-negative breast cancer. For a single mother living paycheck to paycheck who had always been the caregiver rather than the one needing care, the catastrophic illness was both a crisis and an initiation into new ideas about mortality and the gendered politics of illness.

Winner of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction

The Undying: Pain, Vulnerability, Mortality, Medicine, Art, Time, Dreams, Data, Exhaustion, Cancer, and Care | Anne Boyer | Picador | 2020 | 320 pages | ISBN: 978-1250757982 | English edition | WorldCat | 

Desmorir: Una reflexión sobre la enfermedad en un mundo capitalista | Anne Boyer (Author) and Patricia Gonzalo de Jesus (Translator) | Editorial Sexto Piso | 2021 | 250 pages | ISBN: 978-8417517885| Spanish edition | WorldCat

Author

Anne Boyer is a poet and essayist. She was the inaugural winner of the 2018 Cy Twombly Award for Poetry from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts and winner of the 2018 Whiting Award in nonfiction/poetry. Her books include A Handbook of Disappointed Fate as well as several books of poetry, including the 2016 CLMP Firecracker Award–winning Garments Against Women. She was born and raised in Kansas, and was educated in its public schools and libraries. Since 2011, Boyer has been a professor at the Kansas City Art Institute. She lives in Kansas City, Missouri.

Article

What Cancer Takes Away by Anne Boyer. The New Yorker. April 8, 2019  

Book

Hearing the words, "You have breast cancer,” is a devastating blow. To help process their experience and to cope, many individuals turn toward writing and the arts to express themselves and their feelings during this tumultuous time. We Had To Be: An Anthology by Breast Cancer Survivors, Previvors, Thrivers, & their Families, curated and edited by Joely A. Serino, is filled with the writings and artwork of over 30 individuals from more than 8 different countries sharing how breast cancer touched their lives and changed them.

We Had to Be: An Anthology by Breast Cancer Survivors, Previvors, Thrivers, & their Families | Joely A Serino | Independently published | 2022 reprint | 245 pages | ISBN: 979-8834974673 | WorldCat | 

Author

A middle school English Language Arts teacher in New Jersey for 20 years, Joely A Serino started writing poetry to inspire her students -- and she never looked back. She received "Teacher of the Year" twice. Then in January of 2020, right before the world shutdown due to COVID-19, she was was diagnosed with Stage 2 Invasive Ductal Carcinoma. Because of pandemic guidelines, she went through two surgeries, 6 months of TC chemotherapy, and 6 weeks of radiation without the company of family and friends. She hopes her book will help people feel not so alone while going through their cancer journey like she did. Living with her husband and two mini dachshunds, Joely is now cancer-free, working her way through survivorship while on Tamoxifen and continuing to enjoy reading and writing.

Read more of her poetry on Instagram @beautifulmesspoetess