Eva's Story
November is Lung Cancer Awareness Month globally, yet you won’t hear much about it here in Canada. Despite efforts by Lung Cancer Canada, there is no official recognition of Lung Cancer Month in Canada nor is there funding for large-scale promotional efforts. Unless you’ve had personal experience with lung cancer, you probably don’t know that lung cancer is the number one cancer killer. In fact, you probably don’t know anything at all about lung cancer.
When my husband went to his doctor to check on a persistent dry cough, his doctor sent him for an xray. I remember thinking at the time that his doctor was being overly cautious. After all, how serious could a cough be? We did not know that a persistent cough can be one of the symptoms of lung cancer. Even after the x-ray came back showing a shadow on the lung, we did not entertain the possibility of lung cancer. Lung cancer was a smokers’ disease and my husband had never smoked, nor had he been exposed to second hand smoke at work or in the home. When the diagnosis was finally made, we were shocked. Not only did he have lung cancer, but it had already spread to the lymph nodes between the lungs.
We started to do our homework and were dismayed to learn that more people die of lung cancer than breast cancer, colorectal cancer and prostate cancer combined. Some 23,900 Canadians will be diagnosed with lung cancer in 2008; 20,200 will die of it. We had no idea. Most of us don’t. Even more disturbing were the survival rates. According to Lung Cancer Canada, 85% of people diagnosed with lung cancer die within five years.
During my husband’s cancer journey, we experienced firsthand the stigma that goes with lung cancer. While the doctors and staff at the Ottawa Regional Cancer Centre were excellent, we found ourselves explaining repeatedly that no, my husband did not smoke, he had never smoked. The same was true whenever we told others of the diagnosis. Yet 50% of the people who get lung cancer are either former smokers or have never smoked. I can only imagine the stigma that current smokers face in dealing with lung cancer.
So why don’t we talk more about lung cancer? The lack of awareness of lung cancer is usually attributed to two factors: the stigmatization of lung cancer as a smoker’s disease and the lack of survivors to act as spokespersons. Both are sad realities. These factors also contribute to another reality – that lung cancer is unable to attract the corporate sponsors that are essential to mounting large scale awareness campaigns. What company wants to be associated with lung cancer? And yet awareness is essential to attracting the research funding needed to change the statistics on lung cancer. Think of the success that the omnipresent ‘pink’ campaign has had in increasing research funding and improving the odds of beating breast cancer. According to the Canadian Cancer Research Alliance, in 2006, less than 3% of overall cancer research funding was directed to lung cancer. Less than 3% to what is acknowledged to be ‘by far the leading cause of cancer death’.
Awareness is also important for another reason and that’s for making the public aware of the symptoms associated with lung cancer. Like most other cancers, early detection of lung cancer increases the likelihood that treatment will be successful. But unlike most other prevalent cancers, there is no effective screening program for lung cancer. That makes it even more important to be aware of the symptoms. These can include a cough that gets worse or doesn’t go away; breathing problems; chest pain, especially when you cough and coughing up blood; unexplained weight loss and feeling very tired all the time.
My husband died last December. He is now one of the statistics of those who didn’t make it to the five-year mark. Perhaps if he’d got that cough checked out a bit earlier, he might still be here today.
Perhaps it’s time we started talking about lung cancer.
Eva Berringer
Letter to Editor, Ottawa Citizen -
November 21, 2008
