As I mentioned in my last entry my friends sister is facing the possibility of breast cancer and was worrying about paying for a mammogram. Many people may not know there are organizations that help pay for these lifesaving tests for the under and un-insured. When I heard that I began to find organizations that serviced her town. The first place I called was the American Cancer Society their counselors were amazing. I gave them her information and within minutes I had a list of 5 organizations that offered free mammograms and if need be further diagnostic testing. After I hung up with the American Cancer Society I grabbed my computer and started searching the web and was amazed at the information and organizations that helped women just like her.
When I was going through this we had great insurance, my husband is a federal employee so we had good insurance and my out of pocket was already met for the year so I did not even have to pay a copay. If I had not met my out of pocket my insurance would have still covered the mammograms but not everyone is lucky as me. Now I am not lucky when it comes to the cancer but I was lucky enough not to have to worry about being able to afford diagnostic testing and treatments.
I called and gave my new “booby” pal all the information I had received and she was able to get into a mammogram within 1 week of her first call. She had her mammogram last week and the tech originally said that when the test was done she would get a call if she needed any other testing. By the time she was dressed again after the testing she was called in the radiology office where the doctor who read it said to her that she needed further testing, that they saw the same lump on her mammogram and it was definitely not a cyst as originally thought. There is a solid mass in her breast and it was a tumor; that much they knew but they cannot say if it is malignant or benign until they do the needle biopsy next week.
I know waiting is the worst, I just hate to wait. Her sister is stressing because her sister mentioned that she also has enlarged lymph nodes. Now they asked me to be honest but how do I tell my friend that I am fairly confident that her sister most likely has at least stage 3 breast cancer? I am pretty sure it is not an infection because she had lab work done last week also and her white blood counts were not elevated.