~November is Lung Cancer Awareness Month~

As with other Cancers, lung cancer is heartbreaking, deadly and attacks like a army. Before telling useful information and facts about lung cancer, I would like to share my story...

My mother smoked cigarettes for many, many years and all attempts to stop smoking just wasn't successful. In 1997 I remember it so very clearly, I was at work and my mother was at the doctor getting results from test that I had no idea she had taken. While it wasn't the best idea for my middle sister to contact me at work, she did and the words that escaped her mouth I would never forget the feeling I got in the pit of my stomach.... Through tears she said... "Mommy has cancer." The phone dropped without me even realizing it and my heart sank and all I heard her said wasn't those words but to me it conveyed into, "Mommy is dying." I started crying so hard that my supervisor had to take me to her office and let me get it out there. That day began the journey of my mother's cancer fight and has scared as I was, I was determined to help her get through this fight.

We watched as she endured lung surgery to removed half of her lung, chemotherapy that made her extremely sick and took all of her hair, radiation which made it hard for her to breathe and made her chest area hard and discolored. This was not easy to watch but my mother.... My mother is my hero because through it all, she prayed, she smiled she kept a constant smiled and glow to her. You would never believe this woman was enduring so much.

4 years later, they said the cancer had gone however, due to all of this trauma, she had heart trouble, diabetes, thyroid surgery, asthma but the cancer itself had become what I say dormant but what the doctors said... gone....

A year later I would never forget, two days after our birthday (we share the same birthday), in November it was 70 degrees out, we had celebrated our birthday by going to times square and having a ball. Two days later she ended up in the hospital, blood sugar spiked, the admitted her and two days later she was in ICU with the doctors telling us she would not make it, her lungs had filled with blood and the cancer they said was gone had woken up with a vengeance! But my mother wasn't done. God knew the family wasn't ready to lose her. After two days of not waking up, she awaken, bright eyed, smiles and said it was time to come back.

We had my mother for two months and as I write this it's ironic everything was happening in twos. On January 31, 2002, my mother lost that fight to Lung Cancer, and while God gained a angel the world lost a amazing soul....

I told my story to wake people up especially smokers.

Smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer.

Exposure to radon is the second leading cause of lung cancer, and the leading cause in people who have never smoked. For more information about radon and testing your home, please visit EPA.gov/radon.

Other risk factors include:
  - lung scarring from tuberculosis
  - occupational or environmental exposure to:
     • secondhand smoke
     • radiation
     • asbestos
     • air pollution
     • arsenic
     • some organic chemicals

Genetic predisposition may also play a role in lung cancer development.

People who have never smoked account for between 20,000 and 30,000 lung cancer diagnoses every year.

As more people quit smoking, the percentage of cancers diagnosed in people who used to smoke will continue to increase.

For certain people at high risk, screening for lung cancer using low-dose CT scans is proven to save lives. New guidelines will help you understand if CT screening is appropriate for you.

Get screened if you are 55 to 80, you are currently smoking or quit within the past 15 years, you have a smoking history of at least 30 packs. 

1 pack/day X 30 years = 30 pack years

1.5 packs a day X 20 years = 30 pack years

Get screened, get tested, STOP SMOKING!

Signing off

Destiny Santiago

Big Sister On Point