When a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer it's the beginning of series of challenges and choices. And each one can feel like a matter of life and death.
It is the 4th of the month and that means it's time to call your buddy as a reminder to do a self breast exam. It's also time for this month's Buddy Check Report.
When a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer it's the beginning of series of challenges and choices. And each one can feel like a matter of life and death. 7&4's Diana Fairbanks shares one northern Michigan woman's story.
Breast cancer survivor Lynda O'Shea says "I had my normal mammogram. It just came out that I had to have it over again. I got the diagnosis that it was breast cancer, and I had a consultation with Doctor Quinn about my next step."
Surgeon Thomas Quinn, M.D. says, "My first job is actually to be an educator no matter what form of treatment somebody is going to chose you have to know what the options are and in breast cancer fortunately there's more than one good option as to how you are going to treat the problem."
Lynda lives in Copemish, and says it came down to two options: a complete mastectomy and avoid radiation therapy, or partial mastectomy and a course of radiation to follow.
She says, "My first reaction was to have the complete mastectomy. I thought I didn't want to drive to Traverse City every day for 6 weeks and I didn't know if my insurance was going to cover it." And Doctor Quinn says that line of thinking is quite common. "Some women chose one therapy over another out of a sense of convenience."
But he says there is time to take in more information, and even change your mind.
Dr. Quinn says, "They don't need to be panicked into making a snap decision that they have time to weigh what their options are.
And after weighing her options, Lynda did change her mind and is currently going through radiation after a partial mastectomy.
Lynda says, "as a result of some of the negative parts of the complete mastectomy I felt that the partial would be ok for the type of cancer and size they thought that it was. Of course with all cancers they really don't know till they go in there but I felt I would take the chance that it wasn't going to be that large of a mass to remove and that's how I finally came to that decision at the end and I haven't regretted it. My theory has always been ignorance is bliss. Sometimes it's not. I've kind of had to change my motto."
Doctor Quinn encourages women to bring a friend, or relative with them for their initial visit. One reason is because it can be emotional visit and because there is a lot of information to take in.
