Day 2...Health Activist Writer's Challenge...Introduction to Triple Negative Breast Cancer

"Hi...my name is Heather and I have Triple Negative Breast Cancer, I was diagnosed before my cancer even had a name. Leave it to me to start a trend...they said I probably wouldn't live longer than five years...but I showed them. Cancer didn't know who it was up against....that was nine years ago!!"

According to the Triple Negative Breast Cancer Foundation® ,approximately every half an hour another woman in the US is diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer.

Triple negative breast cancer accounts for approximately 15%-25% of all breast cancer cases.

Most Americans are familiar with breast cancer but most don't realize there are many sub-types of breast cancer.

Triple negative breast cancer is one of those sub-types and average Americans probably have not heard of it unless they know someone who has been affected by it.

Triple negative breast cancer refers to any breast cancer that does not express the genes for estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone (PR), or HER2/neu. They are hormone negative thus making it very different in prognosis and treatment as opposed to their hormone positive counterparts.

The prognosis and survival rate for those diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer is usually dependent on the stage of the cancer, aggressiveness, and metastasis.

Far too often the prognosis is not good. Treatments are difficult for this type of breast cancer.

Triple negative breast cancer is a very aggressive breast cancer often affecting woman before the age of 40.

It is also more likely to re-occur than other breast cancers especially in the first 3-5 years.
Triple negative breast cancer is usually treated with aggressive chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

Even with swift and aggressive treatments the battle in this disease is often lost quickly.

I write, speak, advocate, and raise funds for triple negative breast cancer in the hopes that we can put an end to this especially aggressive breast cancer. A breast cancer that quickly takes the lives of young women in their prime...leaving their children without their Mommy, their husbands without a spouse, and the rest of us with a hole in our hearts.