From the first moment my wife discovered
she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from the men I know. Even
ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer seemed to have received
a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did little more than mumble
about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started this
blog…
Every month, I’ll be highlighting breast cancer
research that is going on RIGHT NOW! Harvested from different websites,
journals and podcasts, I’ll translate them into understandable English and
share them with you. Today:
We’ve seen her in
several favorite movies like Failure to
Launch, The Blind Side, Midnight in Paris, in the big hit TV
series lBig Bang Theory, as well as
hearing her voice (albeit unknowingly) in Charlotte’s
Web.
Actor Kathy Bates,
I discovered today, is also a spokeswoman and lobbyist for the Lymphatic Education
& Research Network (LE&RN.)
“Kathy Bates has
successfully battled ovarian cancer since her diagnosis in 2003. In September
2012, she revealed via Twitter that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer
two months earlier and had undergone a double mastectomy. In 2014, at the New
York Walk for Lymphedema & Lymphatic Diseases, Bates announced via
pre-recorded audio that, due to the double mastectomy, she has lymphedema in
both arms. At that time, Bates became the National Spokesperson for the LE&RN and has been actively involved in lymphedema
and lymphatic disease advocacy. On May 11, 2018, Bates led advocates in a
Capitol Hill Lobby Day to garner Congressional support for research funding.
The next day, May 12, Bates addressed supporters at the first-ever DC/VA Walk
to Fight Lymphedema & Lymphatic Diseases at the Lincoln Memorial. She was
awarded the 2018 WebMD Health Heroes ‘Game Changer’ award for her role in
raising awareness of this chronic lymphatic disease.”
What does that
mean, having a spokesperson? How can that make a difference?
In 2016, WBUR reporter
Carey Goldberg interviewed Dr. Michele Berman, co-author of the book, "Reimagining Women's Cancers: The
Celebrity Diagnosis Guide To Personalized Treatment and Prevention."
She and her husband, Dr. Mark Boguski, run CelebrityDiagnosis.com. In that
interview, after discussing the then-new Angelina Jolie diagnosis of a rare
form of breast cancer and her double mastectomy, Goldberg asked, “So ultimately, the moral of this Angelina
effect story is...?”
Dr. Berman said, “Celebrity stories are really
double-edged swords. They can be very helpful. They can be very educational. But
if the information given is just put out there on its own, without appropriate
commentary by people who know what they're talking about, people can get wrong
ideas. They can go looking for cures where there may not be any; they can go
looking for testing where they may not need it.
“It's obvious
these celebrities are not doing this to cause anyone harm. Their intentions are
very good. But their story just doesn't always necessary translate to other
people's stories. The message got out; people learned some more, which is a
good thing. But the message didn't necessarily target the people who were most
at risk.”
Honestly? I can’t
add anything more to this. So there you go!
Resources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Bates,
https://lymphaticnetwork.org/news-events/category/news-sub,
https://www.aacrfoundation.org/Celebrity-Diagnosis/Pages/kathy-bates-lymphedema-breast-cancer.aspx,
https://www.wbur.org/commonhealth/2016/12/16/angelina-celebrity-cancer
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