Her biopsy was negative. She awakened in the recovery room in a similar way, with the same look of fear on her face. I was taught in nursing school the importance of being empathetic with my patients, mourning with my patients who had lost their breast to cancer, and share in their suffering and depression. Though many improvements have been made in the diagnosis and treatment of women with breast cancer, the fear of this disease and its treatment remain. Women have biopsies done under local anesthesia and if breast cancer is found, they have more surgical options than breast cancer patients decades before them.
Breast cancer is no longer a disease that is hushed.
Women have access to support from other survivors and don't have to endure their fears and pain along. Seven years ago, at the age of 38, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Faces of former patients I had cared for after breast cancer surgeries flashed in front of my face for several days after I got my own pathology news. I also didn't learn about my pathology results through traditional methods. I pulled up the report and read the word cancer twelve times.