Tom Corwin is the Health Reporter for The Post and Courier. He is a graduate of the University of Missouri and has covered science, medicine, politics and state legislatures for newspapers in Missouri, Tennessee, Georgia, and South Carolina.
Melissa Jackson wore pink and owned it during the fashion show and fundraiser featuring breast cancer survivors that is the Pink Promenade in Mount Pleasant. While she is doing very well six years after her diagnosis, Jackson is part of a concerning trend as breast cancers are increasing, particularly among younger women, even as deaths decline.
In its biennial update, researchers for the American Cancer Society found that breast cancer increased 1 percent from 2012 to 2021, with the largest increase of 1.4 percent in women under age 50, according to a study published earlier this month in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.
It is a trend Dr. Philip Albaneze, director of breast cancer care at Roper St. Francis Healthcare, is seeing in his patients.
Breast cancer used to be considered a problem for post-menopausal women in their later years but more and more patients are younger now, he said. It is one of the reasons physicians and groups like the cancer society pushed to have recommended yearly mammograms begin at age 40 instead of 50 for women at normal risk, Albaneze said.
Health New breast cancer screening policy goes younger but not often enough, SC doctors say By Tom Corwin [email protected]
This year, the cancer society predicted there will be 310,720 new cases of invasive breast cancer and 42,250 will die from the disease. In South Carolina, that means 5,840 will be diagnosed and 780 will die.
Fortunately, the majority of the recent new cases were early-disease tumors, the report found. And that is a success, Albaneze said.
"So the screening is working," he said. "You're catching early-stage disease." And that impacts survival.
That could be a factor in why deaths continued a three-decade decline from 1989 to 2022 of 44 percent, or more than 500,000 women who were spared due to advances in screening and treatment, the study found. Not everyone benefited equally. Black women had a 38 percent increased risk of dying from breast cancer compared to White women, even though White women are more likely to get breast cancer. Black women are less likely to be diagnosed early, have greater barriers to care because of lack of insurance and access to high-quality screenings and live in poverty, which can affect health outcomes, the study found.
Health Hunger, isolation, other barriers inhibit women from getting mammograms, CDC report finds By Tom Corwin [email protected]
Part of it may also be due to the tumors themselves. Because of the lack of an early attention, Black women are more likely to be diagnosed with larger and more advanced tumors, the study found. They are also more likely to have tumors that lack hormone receptors or a key mutation for which there are targeted treatments, making it more difficult to attack. These are known as "triple negative" breast cancers and the rate among Black women is two or three times higher than for others, the study found.
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It is a major problem for women in the Lowcountry and among his patients, Albaneze said. Recent advancements in chemotherapy and other treatments, including immunotherapy that uses the patient's immune system to help battle the tumor, are improving care for those patients, he said.
"It's going to be quite some years before we see that translate to long-term overall survival, but it will happen," Albaneze said.
Jackson feels fortunate to have the outcome she has had when she was diagnosed at age 49. A suspicious finding on one of her annual mammograms led to a follow-up months later, when her breast cancer was diagnosed in January 2018. Her grandmother had breast cancer and, while Jackson was contemplating her options, her mother was diagnosed with a precancerous lesion. After an MRI also noted a concerning finding in the other breast, she opted for a double mastectomy.
"I just wanted to be done," Jackson said. And because of the surgery and other findings, she was also able to avoid chemotherapy and radiation.
Health American Cancer Society targets rising cancer rates in the young and ending disparities By Tom Corwin [email protected]
But this was the first year she opted to participate in Pink Promenade. Prior to the pandemic, she used to meet with a group of other breast cancer survivors regularly.
"It was just great, you know, being with other women who were going through the same thing, and you could talk about things that other people don't understand," Jackson said. That ended with COVID-19 but it was one of the things that prompted Jackson to participate in the fundraiser with other survivors.
It was nice "being with other women again that have experienced that," she said.
The event also sends a reassuring message for those who have yet to go through it and don't know what to expect, Jackson said.
"It's important just for other women to know that there is life after cancer," she said.
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