LungBlog

One thing that separates out those with lung cancer from those with other forms of cancer, is the stigma associated with it. How many people will ask her if she smoked? Those with lung cancer are often looked upon like they brought this disease on through poor lifestyle choices. What a lonely place to be.

The first thing we want to do is remind anyone who will listen to be supportive. Many people, like our friend, have a lung cancer that is unrelated to smoking. Secondly, we want to revisit and go through what we know about lung cancer prevention in non-smokers - what to avoid, and what to do, to minimize your risk.

The number of non-smokers who develop lung cancer is growing every year.

There are 170,000 cases of lung cancer in the United States each year, and 10% of those are found in non-smokers.

I’m sorry. You don’t have breast cancer,” the oncologist told Charmaine Atkenson.The 48-year-old mother of two had something far worse — stage 4 lung cancer. It had spread to her spine, bursting the bone open. It was not only a sentence of death; it was a judgment.

Even though Atkenson never smoked, she felt almost ashamed. “I found that I never would even say what kind of cancer I had. Or I would always start by saying I never smoked and I never lived with a smoker,” she said in a telephone interview.

From all the pink ribbons, you might think breast cancer is the cancer that most affects women.

But it’s really lung cancer.

In fact, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for both men and women.

And lung cancer kills as many women each year as breast cancer and all gynecological cancers combined.

– African American men are diagnosed with prostate cancer at a higher rate than any other racial or ethnic group in the nation. Lung cancer claims approximately 16,700 African Americans a year; and cancer of the colon remains the third most common cancer among African Americans.

Cancer rates are on the rise because of our unhealthy lifestyles, including lack of exercise, excessive drinking, poor diet and smoking.

As many as one in three of us can expect to suffer from a form of cancer at some point in our lives so it’s time to start reducing your risk today…

 Let’s face it, Americans are obsessed with breasts. Sometimes an obsession can prove positive, like when it promotes greater awareness and increased funding to fight breast cancer. Unfortunately, another kind of cancer, lung cancer, causes almost twice as many deaths among women. That’s why National Lung Cancer Partnership today launched a national, multi-media public service announcement (PSA) campaign to inform women about their risk for lung cancer and urge them to find out more about this deadly disease.

A ‘carcinogen’ is something that can help to cause cancer. Tobacco smoke is a powerful carcinogen. But not everyone who smokes gets lung cancer. So there must be other factors at work.

Most people assumethat cancer is genetic and cannot be avoided. However, according to the
American Cancer Society, healthy behaviors could prevent approximately half of cancer deaths. Below is a list of 10 lifestyle changes, all based on the latest research, which people can make to improve their odds of preventing cancer or catching it at its earliest, most curable stages.

Lung cancer is the No. 1 cause of death from cancer. It is a national health crisis; there is a gross imbalance in cancer research funding. I know that many of you have had family, friends and co-workers meet an untimely death because of this disease. This will continue to be the case if we do not speak out.