The connection between breast and ovarian cancer
By Jody Chapin
SAVANNAH, GA (WTOC) - Women need to be pro-active when it comes to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases like cancer.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and September was Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month and area doctors are working to raise awareness about the connection between the two and what can be done to prevent and treat those kinds of cancer.
About a year ago, Carol Greenberg noticed a difference in her health.
“I wasn’t feeling well, feeling bloated, weight fluctuation and difficulty with stomach ailments,” remembers Greenberg. “I felt like I was carrying around a satchel on my belly.”
Dr. James Burke is a gynecologic oncology surgeon in the Anderson Cancer Institute at Memorial Health University Medical University. He says ovarian cancer is hard to spot.
“As far as screening, there just really isn’t anything yet,” says Dr. Burke.
There’s no annual screening test available like the mammogram for breast cancer so for more than a decade, he and his partner have been taking their message about looking for the signs of ovarian cancer to primary care doctors in the area.
“Bloating, pain in the pelvic area, problems with GI tract, problems with urinary tract, if any of these things start and persist for more than a week those patients need to be evaluated,” says Burke.
For Greenberg, surgery and chemotherapy are behind her now.
“She is cancer free right now,” says Burke. ”And that’s a good thing.”
But during the process, Greenberg learned something about her family history that is important to her future.
“That I’m BRCA 1 positive,” says Greenberg. The BRCA 1 is a gene that can increase a person’s risk of cancer.
And as an ovarian cancer survivor with the BRCA 1 gene, that puts her at a higher risk for breast cancer.
“Women who have the BRCA 1 gene defect, over their life time have an 80 percent chance of breast cancer,” says Burke.
“I really think the message for anybody is that you have to know your own body, know your family history,” says Greenberg.
“When we see patients as physicians, we’re taking a family history, we start seeing multiple family members that are popping up with breast cancer, which again is much more common than ovarian cancer, then that raises the flag that maybe this is a genetic connection here.” says Burke.
Greenberg has started a group called TRIP, which stands for Teal Ribbon Project to help women find answers to cancer questions.
