Category: Patient

  • Advocacy groups: I got more out of it than they did

    Several years ago when I was a new genetic counselor, doe-eyed and fresh out of grad school, I made sure certain topics came up in every session I had with a family.

  • Giving Back and Paying it Forward

    Having been directly affected by breast cancer, it would be impossible to expect that it hasn’t altered my perspective on the important, and not so important, things in life. I feel an intense need to pay it forward or, shall I say, give back. I’ve lost several friends to the very same disease, and now my mother…

  • Watching and Waiting for Cancer

    So I met all the doctors. What now? All the information and options were given to me, and it was overwhelming, to say the least. I was considering both preventive surgeries (full hysterectomy and preventive bilateral mastectomy (PBM) with reconstruction). I was playing the “odds versus timing” game in my head: “If I wait until I’m X…

  • Understanding Screening Guidelines

    Cancer is smarter than man. It develops whenever it wants to without asking for permission from us. That is a fact. However, medicine has evolved over centuries to the point that we can predict which population is at risk for certain cancers. We have also developed processes that allow for us to check for the…

  • 3 reasons why this blog is worth your time

    By now, I hope some of you are coming to hereditarycancer.com regularly to poke around, and to check for new “BRCA & Beyond” posts. If you’re not a regular, welcome! If you are familiar with our blog, you’ll notice that I’m a new voice to the mix. My name is Deepti Babu, and I am a genetic counselor. After…

  • 6 questions to ask your doctor about your cancer diagnosis

    Doubt, anger and confusion. These are understandable feelings to have, if you or someone close to you discovers that you/they have cancer, or may carry genes that increase the risk for cancer. What does that mean? What happens now? What is cancer? You may have been given unexpected news and may not know where to turn, who…

  • Being Your Own Healthcare Advocate

    There is no manual to this cancer thing. I quickly learned that I would have to be my own best advocate.

  • How can I reduce my risk or prevent cancers?

    These two questions are commonly asked when someone realizes that they (or their family member) have an increased risk to develop a particular cancer in their lifetime. It should be understood that every living person has a small chance to develop various cancers throughout his/her life. Cancers are a group of more than 100 diseases…

  • Now that I know my DNA is messed up, what do I do next?

    Sharing the news about my test results with my immediate family was tough. I’ll offer some thoughts here based on my experience, but you’ll know what works best for you. The adult conversations I had ended up with me being asked a lot of questions, and I didn’t even yet know the answers. If this…

  • What does it even mean to have a BRCA gene mutation?

    Our “BRCA & Beyond” blog continues to be a place where we discuss and share information about important topics surrounding BRCA1/2 mutations, and we hope you find it helpful. For this post, I wanted to share some scientific background with you about what it actually means to have a BRCA1/2 (often referred to as “BRCA”) gene mutation that causes hereditary breast and ovarian cancer (HBOC). We all…