SCHEDULE YOUR MAMMOGRAM.
We’re not even a quarter of the way through 2020 and yet we already have an important day to commemorate:
February 4th is World Cancer Day.
World Cancer Day is designed to raise awareness of cancer around the world and encourage its prevention, detection, and treatment.
It should be a particularly important day for women. Cancer is the second leading cause of death in women throughout the world, and breast cancer tops the list in most countries as the most common malignancy in women.
In 2019, about 268,000 women in the US received that dreaded diagnosis and 41,760 died from it.
That’s the bad news. The good news is that the death rate in breast cancer has plummeted in the past 20 years thanks to earlier diagnosis and major advances in treatment.
Earlier diagnosis is due to one thing: mammograms. The connection is simple: mammograms find cancers early when they are more treatable. Early treatment of early stage cancer leads to fewer deaths.
Today, 90 percent of women diagnosed with invasive breast cancer are still alive in five years; while 83 percent are still alive in 10 years. More than half of all breast cancers in the US today are diagnosed before they have spread, which has a 99 percent five-year survival rate.
So why do so many women skip their mammograms?
Fear. Forgetfulness. Time. Anxiety.
We get it. Turning up for a test and possibly finding out that you have cancer is no one’s favorite thing to do. But the likelihood that the test will find a cancer is so much smaller than the likelihood it won’t. Isn’t the peace of mind that result provides worth a half hour of your day?
So, go ahead. In honor of World Cancer Day pick up the phone. Log onto your computer. And make that appointment now. Start 2020 off in the right way, the healthy way, the way to ensure that you’re here for your friends, your family, your children and grandchildren in 2021 and beyond.
Sources:
- American Cancer Society. Cancer Statistics, 2019.
- World Health Organization. Cancer: Key Facts. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/cancer
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