October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month

The month of October has long been known as Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It’s a time to zero in on sharing information about breast health care if you will.
According to the website cancer.org, Cancer grows when a cell’s DNA is damaged, but why or how that DNA becomes damaged is still unknown. The damage could be caused by genetic, environmental, or lifestyle factors, or in most cases, a combination of the two. Most patients will never know exactly what caused their cancer. However, there are certain established risk factors that are associated with breast cancer.
Genetic risk factors are inherited or passed down from parent to child through genes. These risk factors cannot be changed because they are built into your DNA from birth.
Environmental and lifestyle risk factors are avoidable risk factors that are typically under an individual’s control. These risk factors can be reduced by changing elements within your environment or making alterations to your lifestyle.
So, how did Breast Cancer Awareness Month become a thing? Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM), also referred to in the United States as National Breast Cancer Awareness Month (NBCAM), is an annual international health campaign organized by major breast cancer charities every October to increase awareness of the disease and raise funds for research into its cause, prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and cure.
NBCAM was founded in 1985 in a partnership between the American Cancer Society and the pharmaceutical division of Imperial Chemical Industries (now part of AstraZeneca, producer of several anti-breast cancer drugs). The aim of the NBCAM from the start has been to promote mammography as the most effective weapon in the fight against breast cancer.
In 1993, Evelyn Lauder, Senior Corporate Vice President of the Estée Lauder Companies, founded the Breast Cancer Research Foundation and established the pink ribbon as its symbol–though this was not the first time the ribbon was used to symbolize breast cancer. A 68-year-old California woman named Charlotte Haley, whose sister, daughter, and granddaughter had breast cancer had distributed peach-color ribbons to call attention to what she perceived as inadequate funding for research. In the fall of 1991, the Susan G. Komen Foundation handed out pink ribbons to participants in its New York City race for breast cancer survivors.
Across the city at select Black churches, throughout the month of October, “PinkTober” Pop-Ups have been happening. Participating churches included Mount Carmel Baptist Church at 57th and Race Streets, Mount Pisgah AME Church at 428 N. 41st Street, and Christian Stronghold Church at 47th and Lancaster. On October 27, there will be a Pinktober Pop-Up at Second Antioch Church at 918 N. 41st Street immediately following Sunday service.
Dr. Loretta Sweet Jemmott was a guest speaker at Mount Carmel Baptist Church on the first Sunday in October, after service in the Fellowship Hall, as part of PinkTober breast cancer awareness activities sponsored by Drexel University College of Nursing and Health Professions. Dr. Jemmott shared critical information about breast health care. Dr. Jemmott stated, “Breast cancer is here, and it’s really growing. The type of breast cancer that can kill people. There’s something called triple-negative breast cancer, that’s a really aggressive form of breast cancer, and it’s hitting younger women than the normal age for people who might be diagnosed with breast cancer. We really have to be on top of our breast health care. Women have to get their breasts screened. They must get mammograms after a certain age. If your healthcare provider tells you that you need to get a breast screening every year, get it every year. The problem with us (African American women) is that we don’t get screened. Breast cancer is the second most common cause of cancer deaths in Black women. Black and white women get breast cancer at the same rate, but Black women are twice as likely to die from breast cancer.”
Dr. Jemmott added, “Black women are also the group that gets the more aggressive form of breast cancer. Black women, get yourself screened. In getting screened, if there’s something there (in your breast), it can be detected early. You have to get screened regularly. I also say you’ve got to look at your breasts on a regular basis. You’ve got to do your own self-breast examination. There are two things that Black women need to do. One is getting screened. And two is to get to know your breasts. Look at them in the mirror. Understand what’s going on with your breast. Take off your bra, look in the mirror, and do it regularly. You are the first person who can detect what’s going on with your breasts.”
Loretta Sweet Jemmott, PhD, is an expert in health promotion research and is one of the nation’s foremost investigators in the field of HIV/AIDS prevention, with perhaps the most consistent track record of evidence-based HIV risk-reduction interventions. She and her husband, John B. Jemmott, III, PhD, have attracted more than $150 million in NIH funding over the past two decades to design and test interventions to reduce the risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among diverse populations in the U.S., Botswana, South Africa, Jamaica, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. She has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles, books, and chapters. Her studies not only reported reducing risk-associated sexual behaviors but also the incidence of STIs.
Jemmott is an outstanding translational and community-engagement researcher. She partnered with community-based organizations, from churches and clinics to barbershops, housing developments, and schools, transforming her research outcomes for use in real-world settings. To date, eight of her evidence-based interventions have been designated by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Adolescent Health for national and international dissemination used in 48 states across the nation.
After retiring from a successful 20-year tenure at the University of Pennsylvania, she joined Drexel in 2015 as vice president for Health and Health Equity and professor in the College of Nursing and Health Professions. Here she led the We’re Here Because We Care: Building Healthy Communities Together, using a qualitative, community-engaged approach to determine their health concerns and partnered with them to create health promotion initiatives. This led to the creation of Drexel’s Community Wellness HUB. Jemmott also works with faculty to build their program of research, co-leads the Implementation Science Research Working Group and the Fall Institute on Implementation Science Research, and teaches community engagement, intervention development, and implementation science courses.
Whatever you do ladies, make sure you regularly check your breast after age 40. If there’s a history in your family of breast cancer, you should start having mammograms in your twenties. Early detection can save lives.
Meanwhile, there’s another way we can “save lives” in our country, and that’s by going to the polls on Tuesday, November 5th, and voting. If you are 18 and over and are a registered voter, you need to take your soles to the polls on election day.