National Mammography Day is Oct. 21
October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. If you do not already have annual mammograms, please consider starting now.
Lesbians and bisexual women, for a variety of reasons — including barriers to treatment — are at an increased risk of developing breast cancer. The National gay and Lesbian Task Force urges all women to stay healthy and join the fight against breast cancer by having mammogram screenings this month.
National Mammography Day is Oct. 21, 2005. Early detection through annual mammograms is a critical tool in combating cancer. Every 2 minutes a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer, and it is the leading cancer among white and African-American women.
Lesbians and bisexual women face unique health challenges, one of them being access to medical treatment. Women often face a barrier to just visiting the doctor for a check-up because they may not be out in their community and may not feel comfortable answering questions from their health provider about their sexual orientation.
“The biggest challenge in working on lesbian health issues involves understanding that there are many different types of lesbians and just one message about health behavior won’t work. In the same that health promotion messages about safe sex and HIV/AIDS have come to be tailored to various subgroups, the same is true for, let’s say, breast health screening,†says Kathleen Maloy, chair of the board at the Mautner Project and professor of health policy at George Washington University School of Public Health. “Age, race and class are all part of the issue.
“Furthermore, lesbians, like women in general, have a higher rate of being uninsured because women tend to be in lower paying jobs and so access to treatment and screening is even more difficult.â€
The Empty Closet
Read Three Lesbians Talk About Breast Cancer at Out In The Mountains.
Next month is National Novel Writing Month (thanks for reminding me, Sue).
daily dose of news: Supporters, foes of gay marriage trade dirty tricks charges Miers confirmation hearings to start on Nov. 7 Gay haunt killers ‘may have threatened woman’ Officials: Tunnel threat tip came from Netherlands A PROM TWIST: KING & QUEEN ARE GAY, LESBIAN Rice: U.S. will defeat insurgency, rebuild Iraq National Gay Rights Activist Makes Up With Bloomberg
::sigh:: My partner’s former partner died of breast cancer — in October (of last year). She was so frustrated with the state of the art of treatment that just before she died, she ordered that money (in lieu of flowers) be given to the Humane Society instead of for Cancer Research.