3 Things You Need to Know about Breast Cancer, Courtesy of the Kay Yow Cancer Fund
If you were watching ABC11 on air Monday, you likely noticed most of our staff sporting the color pink in honor of October being Breast Cancer Awareness month. While most people are aware of the disease, they may forget to take the necessary steps to catch it in its earliest stages. And, when breast cancer is detected at a localized stage, the survival rate is 98-percent.
And that's a message the Kay Yow Cancer Fund wants to pass along. The organization was officially founded in December of 2007 by its namesake, former N.C. State University head women's basketball coach Kay Yow. Although she passed away in 2009, her dream lives on through her fund which has compiled three main points concerning the disease.
First, one in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime, a number that has actually increased recently.
"So more women are being diagnosed. However, with research like what the fund is doing and other great organizations, more women are surviving breast cancer," explained Brenda Steen, with the Kay Yow Cancer Fund.
Second, mammography has helped reduce breast cancer deaths in the U.S. by one-third since 1990.
"It is huge and that's particularly important to the Kay Yow Cancer Fund, since we have helped fund REX's mobile mammography units. They travel to under-served areas within North Carolina to provide mammographies to women who are under-insured or uninsured who would otherwise not be diagnosed," said Breen.
And third, breast cancer doesn't discriminate. It's the most common type of cancer in every racial and ethnic group.
"Coach Yow coached women's basketball for more than 34 years, so her players started at about the age of 18 and graduated at 22, and she kept in touch with her former players. Her players spread across all ethnic and racial backgrounds, so it was part of her mission to fund research for all women," Breen explained.
You can learn more about the Kay Yow Cancer Fund through their website: http://kayyow.com/
