MS Maze

Having cancer is stressful enough, but what if potentially lifesaving chemotherapy drugs were in short supply and unavailable to you? And how would you feel if these shortages were entirely preventable?

President Obama recently signed an executive order directing the FDA to step up work to reduce drug shortages. Drug companies will be required to let the FDA know of the possibility of drug shortages sooner. The FDA and the Department of Justice will be investigating abuses that would lead to drug shortages, and agencies will be empowered to stop the practice of driving up prices and creating shortages due to the manipulations of companies or distributors.

Why are many cancer drugs in short supply?

Read: Economics Behind Cancer Drug Shortages

It is estimated that more than 65 million people in the United States provide care for a chronically ill, disabled or aging family member or friend during any given year. It takes a physical, emotional, and financial toll, and is an all but invisible labor of love.

Who are the caregivers? Sixty-six percent of family caregivers are women and more than 37 percent are also responsible for children and grandchildren under age 18. Caregiving goes on largely behind closed doors, before and after outside employment.

Read: Caring for the Caregivers

People who are overly optimistic in the face of contrary evidence may have “faulty” function of their frontal lobes, according to new research.

Researchers at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at University College London (UCL) found that people who are very optimistic about the outcome of events tend to learn only from information that reinforces their “rose-tinted view of the world.”

Read it: Is it always good to be optimistic?

Giuliana Rancic, the 36-year-old host of “E! News” and “Fashion Police” announced on the “Today Show” that she has early stage breast cancer.

The cancer was discovered on a mammogram she had at the insistence of her infertility specialist, according to an article in Boston Globe. Unless there is a particularly high risk of breast cancer, mammograms are generally not recommended for women under the age of 40.

Read it: Giuliana Rancic has Breast Cancer: The Evidence and Emotions of Mammograms

Living with Triple-Negative Breast Cancer
(#24 in a series)

What would you do if you found a lump in your breast? I called a doctor, but not everyone agrees that was the right decision.

Some readers said I shouldn’t have reached out to the medical community, shouldn’t have had surgery, chemotherapy, or radiation. I say it’s a personal decision, one we must each make based on our individual case. I told my story but do not give medical advice, unless you consider my plea to check your own breasts or to at least talk to a doctor to be medical advice.

Read it: What would you do if you found a lump in your breast?

Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Profiles
Carmelita P: Grieving Son Recounts Mom’s Battle with Triple-Negative Breast Cancer
Nancy Steiler: Searching for “Normal” After Cancer
Eileen Z. Fuentes: Living with a Grateful Vibration
Meagan Farrell: Cancer Survivor Says “Let Go of the Little Stuff”
Melissa Stukenborg: When Worst Fear Becomes Reality, Find Your Inner Strength

Related
Breast Cancer Awareness: Taking it Personally
Man with Breast Cancer says, “Don’t be embarrassed…it’s too important”
Living with Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Series
My Video: What is Triple-Negative Breast Cancer?
My Book: No More Secs! Living, Laughing & Loving Despite Multiple Sclerosis
Follow on Twitter @AnnPietrangelo

It’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month and I’m not asking you to buy or wear pink ribbons. Or pink hats or pink tee shirts or pink wristbands. I’m not asking you to post a strange status to your Facebook profile. I’m not asking for donations or for you to hang your bra out the window. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Whether or not you do any of those things, I hope you do something else to make it a little more personal.

Read it: Breast Cancer Awareness: Taking it Personally

Related:
5 Things about Breast Cancer You Should Take to Heart
Man with Breast Cancer says, “Don’t be embarrassed…it’s too important”
Video: What the Heck is Triple-Negative Breast Cancer?
Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Series

Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Profiles
Carmelita P: Grieving Son Recounts Mom’s Battle with Triple-Negative Breast Cancer
Nancy Steiler: Searching for “Normal” After Cancer
Eileen Z. Fuentes: Living with a Grateful Vibration
Meagan Farrell: Cancer Survivor Says “Let Go of the Little Stuff”
Melissa Stukenborg: When Worst Fear Becomes Reality, Find Your Inner Strength
Related Profile: Alyssa Phillips: Inspiration, Survivor, Miracle: An Amazing Life

It’s pink ribbon time again. That time of year when we’re bombarded with all things pink to bring attention to breast cancer, it’s causes, treatment, and funding for research.

There’s a lot of talk about “boobies” and “ta-tas,” but there’s a whole lot more to it than saving breasts — it’s about saving lives.

When it comes to breast cancer awareness, many people still don’t realize that men can get breast cancer, too. The numbers are small, but cancer is cancer and, if you’re a man, you need to know that a lump in your breast area should not be ignored.

And did you know that not all breast cancers are alike? Or what it means when your diagnosis is “triple-negative breast cancer?”

Last October I did my part in blogging for breast cancer awareness. As I wrote those posts, I was unaware that a fast-growing tumor was about to make its presence known in my own breast. I am very fortunate to be here this October to help with another Breast Cancer Awareness Month, this time with some personal experience to back it up.

I’ll be posting a wrap-up of my year-long journey on Care2.com on October 14 — one year from the day that I discovered that ominous lump. My birthday also happens to fall in October and I am beyond grateful that I was able to add another candle to the cake.

Related Reading:
Man With Breast Cancer Says, “Don’t Be Embarrassed…It’s Too Important”
Video: What the Heck is Triple-Negative Breast Cancer?
Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Series

More kids are showing up in hospital emergency rooms because of accidental poisoning from medication, according to a study from the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. Over half a million children are exposed to pharmaceuticals each year.

Read it: Pediatric Medication Poisoning on the Rise

The morning of September 11, 2001 is forever seared into our nation’s collective consciousness. Horrific loss of life, massive destruction of landmarks, and infiltration of our air travel system rocked our very foundation, shattering any sense of security we may have had.

We’ve had a lot of healing to do, both as individuals, and as a nation. I asked several experts in human psychology how they think we have healed … or not healed in the past 10 years.

Read it: Ten Years Later: How 9/11 Changed Our Nation

Women and girls in Ethiopia are disproportionately affected by the prolonged drought in Ethiopia because the burden for most household tasks falls on them.

Read it: Drought in Ethiopia Hits Girls and Women Hardest

There are four things you can do to increase your odds of living a longer, healthier life. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), seven out of 10 deaths in the United States each year are caused by chronic illnesses. Fifty percent of all deaths are from heart disease, cancer, and stroke.

Some lifestyle choices can add to our risk of chronic illness and early death.

Read it: 4 Ways to Live Longer

Big tobacco is suing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) over the graphic images mandated to appear on every pack of cigarettes sold in the U.S. after September 2012. (See all nine images below.)The warnings are required under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act passed by Congress and signed into law in June 2009.

In a press release, Lorillard, Inc., the third largest manufacturer of cigarettes in the U.S., said the warnings are an “unconstitutional way of forcing tobacco manufacturers to disseminate the government’s anti-smoking message.”

Read it: Big Tobacco Sues FDA over Shocking Warning Labels

New research out of the UK has doubled the number of genes associated with multiple sclerosis (MS). Twenty-nine new genetic variants linked to MS have been identified by researchers from the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford.

Researchers studied the DNA of 9,772 people with MS and 17,376 unrelated healthy controls. Many of the genes are relevant to the workings of the immune system, giving scientists new clues into how MS develops.

Read it: New Genetic Clues into Cause of Multiple Sclerosis

Breast Cancer in the News
She was fighting for the right to keep custody of her children despite having stage 4 breast cancer, but the North Carolina Supreme Court ruled against Alaina Giordano.

Ms. Giordano is legally bound to pack up her kids, ages 6 and 11, and send them to live with their father, who now lives in Chicago. “As I write today, I deal with the difficult recognition that my children will have to live 800 miles away from me, until my appeal can be heard. In the wake of this legal decision, my children and I now must grieve the pending loss of each other,” she wrote in a press release.

Read it: Mom with Breast Cancer Loses Custody: Kids Must Go

Living with Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Series

A murderous spree at a youth summer camp in Oslo, Norway last month ended in 76 deaths. Working methodically, a lone gunman fired at teenagers at a youth camp as their young friends watched in horror and scrambled for safety.

Much has been made about the motives and the twisted psyche of the murderer, but not so much attention has been given to the young victims who survived his rampage. What happens when the vague concept of death and the sense of immortality possessed by most teenagers is shattered in an instance horrific violence? How will they recover from such a nightmare?

For insight into the recovery process, we turned to Ellin Bloch, Ph.D., California School of Professional Psychology, Los Angeles, who specializes in trauma psychology and recovery.

Read it: Norway Shooting Survivors: The Long Road to Recovery and Peace