News Articles I've Been Reading

Shortening Radiation in Breast Cancer Patients: I am all for it. Check this out in the Boston Globe.

I was reading an article in Newsweek online and it got me down, quite honestly. I guess I've been hoping that the news on cancer research and treatments would be better. I do think that there's a trend to shake it up. That people are demanding better and more options for treatment. If the same-old-thing isn't always working, why are they still practicing it?

When I was in my chemo-faze I heard a report that stated that the chemo-therapy used was basically ineffective in 90% or more of the women it was used in. WHAT? If I'd heard that and had not had the benefit of actually feeling my tumor dissolving, I'd have been beyond pissed off. Apparently I was one of the patients who reacted to that drug cocktail. But can you even imagine going through chemo and then reading that it is not likely that it was effective for you?

Chemo patients are losing their hair, their eyelashes and brows, they cannot eat, they are tired and the chemicals potentially, take years off your life as they "save" you. The drugs can damage other systems; cardio-pulminary for one and if I jacked up my lungs pumping ineffective chemicals into my body for 4 months I'd become a homicidal maniac. I promise. There aren't strong enough anti-anxiety drugs in the universe top curb that kind of rage.

I'm hopeful about the efforts of Stand Up 2 Cancer. I believe that the American Cancer Society and the Lance Armstrong Foundation are bringing cancer to the foreground in the sea of causes that need support. We need to fight cancer - not only breast cancer or other specifics. WE need to raise smart children, support sciences, enable the best and brightest, encourage them, be brave, do the clinical trials and stop the devastation.

There are so many things to consider this Fall and always with regard to our leaders and our spending, but I hope that we all consider what will most likely touch our lives. Should we spend Billions daily for democracy in Iraq? Maybe a few bucks to help our own people with our own struggles would be prudent. Just a thought.

Maybe I'll write in Lance Armstrong in November. No one else is really winning me over.