Breast Cancer Awareness – Memphis Flyer

The Memphis chapter of Sisters Network, a national organization composed of African-American breast cancer survivors, is hosting its third annual “1st Ladies Prayer Brunch” this Saturday.

The prayer brunch will take place at the University of Memphis Holiday Inn (3700 Central Ave.) Saturday, November 2nd. It will last from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Well-known pastor Rev. Percy McCray, director of Pastoral Care for the Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA), will be the keynote speaker at the brunch. McCray will share an inspirational message on the importance of patients and their families utilizing faith and spirituality when battling something as challenging as breast cancer.

The event will also feature a networking session, panel discussion, and an opportunity for attendees to participate in a question and answer session with medical experts. The overall objective of the prayer brunch is to encourage women to take their health more seriously and also embrace their relationship with God to help fight obstacles such as breast cancer.

In the U.S., more than 200,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer each year, according to the American Cancer Society (ACS). In 2013, more than 27,000 African-American women are estimated to be diagnosed with breast cancer and over 6,000 of these women will succumb to it.

Although white women are diagnosed with breast cancer twice as much as African-American women, black women are 41 percent more likely to die from breast cancer, according to ACS. This is largely attributed to them being more susceptible to “triple negative breast cancer” (breast cancer not caused by the three usual receptors known to fuel most breast cancers: estrogen receptors, progesterone receptors, and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2). Black women are also statistically more likely to lack insurance coverage and less likely to undergo normal visits to the doctor for health screenings.

For more information on the prayer brunch, contact Sisters Network Memphis president Carolyn Whitney at (901) 789-7239 or visit sistersnetworkmemphis.org

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The American Cancer Society estimated more than 19,000 black women would be diagnosed with breast cancer this year — the second-most common cancer among black women, surpassed only by lung cancer.

And while the incidence of breast cancer is about 12 percent lower in black women than in white women, with black women, it often strikes at an earlier age, and the mortality rate is higher.

Since October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, many women schedule their annual mammograms during the month to make it easier to remember. Others make mammogram appointments on or near their birthdays.

According to the American Cancer Society’s “Cancer Facts & Figures for African-Americans 2007-2008” booklet, “Factors that contribute to the higher death rates among African-American women include differences in access to and utilization of early detection and treatment, risk factors that are differentially distributed by race or socio-economic status, or biological differences associated with race.”

As Netwellness.org reports, “Statistics show that overall, when African-American women are diagnosed, they have larger tumors and their breast cancer has spread further (i.e., to the lymph nodes and to other parts of the body).”

The five-year breast-cancer survival rate for black women is 69 percent, compared with 84 percent for white women. And while there has been an increase in the number of women getting mammograms, black women still tend to have fewer mammograms and are more likely to be diagnosed after the cancer has spread.

If that’s not enough to get you into a doctor’s office, consider this: Black women are also disproportionately prone to a rare, particularly virulent form of breast cancer that tends to strike women under the age of 35.

According to a study published in June 2006 in the Journal of the American Medical Association, black women under the age of 50 have a 77 percent higher mortality rate from breast cancer than other women of the same age group.

The study, led by scientists at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, said that younger, pre-menopausal black women are more prone to an especially aggressive type of cancer.

In addition to the UNC study, researchers at Emory University and the University of Chicago are trying to determine the root cause of the cancer and why it strikes young black women decades before menopause, when most breast cancer develops.

And don’t forget to check the medical history of your father’s family. In June, JAMA published the results of a study that revealed that a pattern of hereditary breast cancer may be hard to detect because a family is so small or has so few female members that it doesn’t appear to be prevalent. However, the cancer gene can be passed on from the father’s side of the family, as well as the mother’s, because every person inherits half of her genes from her mother and half from her father.