A 30-year-old non-smoker posted a photo of herself, taken the day she was diagnosed with metastasized lung cancer.
“When you have cancer, it won’t necessarily show from the outside.” August 12, Vicky veness, a 30-year-old Briton from Cheltenham, a town 150 km west of London, posted a photo of her, smiling, on her Facebook account. But the accompanying message is not light. It “can be overwhelming to read,” she warns.
She says that this photo, that of a beautiful young woman, smiling, was taken just hours before an appointment with her doctor, during which she learned that she was “suffering from cancer of the breast. stage IV lung ”. Or cancer that has spread to other organs, metastasized cancer.
Cancer mistaken for asthma
Vicky Veness however imposes an impeccable hygiene of life, which left nothing to suspect the existence of such a disease. She is slim, athletic – she even made it her profession, by becoming a personal trainer -, runs regularly and eats healthily. She doesn’t smoke either.
For 18 months, she has nevertheless suffered from respiratory symptoms, which her doctors “swept away” by associating them with asthma. For a year and a half, her cancer was therefore able to develop without being controlled, until it reached a stage that was difficult to treat, and with a very poor vital prognosis.
“Symptoms can be subtle, and only show up occasionally,” she says. The moral of this story is this: If you feel bad for any reason, no matter how stupid you think you are, go see your doctor, ask whatever questions you can think of, and go back until you get the answers you need ”.
Other risk factors than tobacco
Vicky Veness’s story is also a reminder that lung cancer isn’t just for smokers. It is the second most common cancer in men, and the third in women, recalls Institut Curie, which also emphasizes that it is increasingly so. In 2O12, 40,000 cases were diagnosed.
“Smoking is one of the main risk factors, but cancer can occur in patients who have never smoked,” confirms the Foundation. Other factors may be involved: occupational exposure (asbestos), cannabis or air pollution. “
11% of cancers in non-smokers
According to a study carried out in 2010 in 104 pneumology departments of French hospitals, 11% of bronchopulmonary cancers are diagnosed in people who have never smoked. And, among them, one in five declares to have been exposed to second-hand smoke. These are most often women (70% of cancers in non-smokers).
“These non-smoking patients are older than the average patient suffering from the same pathology,” then specified Dr. Daniel Coëtmeur, in charge of the study. Their case is often severe (bone metastases) because the first symptoms, in people who did not seem to present any risk factors, were underestimated. A cough that persists beyond three weeks, the first coughing up blood should alert ”.
Another study conducted in the UK and US suggests that for small cell lung cancers, of which 28% are diagnosed in non-smokers. A rate that would have doubled in a few years.
Vicky Veness’s warning may help those 11% of patients who may be left behind by delayed diagnosis to gain chances of survival. For her part, she says she has spent the most trying week of her life, but is now ready to face cancer. “It’s time to fight it,” she concludes.
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