BREAST CANCER CHARITY AIMS TO SAVE LIVES
A NEW BREAST CANCER AWARENESS PROGRAMME LAUNCHES IN NW REGION
ONE in every nine Irish women will get breast cancer.
Rachel Fitzgearld -Feeley never imagined she would be diagnosed with the potentially fatal disease but at the young age of 28 doctors confirmed she had breast cancer.
Ten years cancer free this year, Rachel can still remember the diagnosis like it was yesterday.
“I was not looking for breast cancer and never did any checks. Luckily I had two visual signs, my left breast was enlarged and it became red all over. I went to my GP and then the hospital where I got an ultra sound and three to four lumps were found,” she explains.
Dublin born Rachel who has been living in Boyle for twenty years says the doctors then told her she would have to have her breasts removed. She was in a state of shock: “I just went with what the doctors said. I was able to deal with it better the more information I had. There is a lot of different stages of dealing with cancer over the years. I still have my down days today.”
But back then a survival instinct kicked in and within a couple of weeks Rachel underwent a 6 hour mastectomy and reconstruction surgery.
Newly wed Rachel now works for Breast Cancer Ireland, a national charity established to raise funding for research as well as to promote awareness of breast health.
There are currently 2,500 new cases diagnosed annually and while Ireland’s survival rate stands at 80 percent, more needs to be done in terms of education and making women of all ages breast aware.
And it’s Rachel’s job - as outreach coordinator for Breast Cancer Ireland - to raise awareness, a role she is passionate about.
She travels across Sligo bringing her one woman road show on breast cancer awareness to schools, businesses and women’s groups. “My aim is to educate women so that it becomes normal for them to routinely check themselves. This is very important because there is a lack of aware- ness and education in Ireland and there is still a huge fear around breast cancer and even being breast aware. I experience it all the time. It’s vital to educate women, not worry them, and that is what my talk is all about,” she says.
Rachel stresses: “Having the symptoms does not always mean breast cancer but we need to remove the fear, change mindsets, make women proactive so that they are more knowledgeable. If a woman is introduced to breast cancer awareness at 15, it can become a normal routine from an early age.”
The risk of breast cancer however does increase with age. Only 14 percent of cases are under the age of 44 years old, 49 percent are between the ages of 45 and 64 years of age while 37 percent are over the age of 65.
Interestingly only 5 to 10 percent of breast cancer cases are hereditary. As a cancer survivor Rachel says her job is the perfect fit as people can relate to her story. All of her talks are free of charge. Rachel admits: “I can still get angry at shampoo adverts on the TV or sometimes wish I had my old chest back, but I’m a breast cancer survivor, that’s what is important.”