Angelina Jolie has double mastectomy

Angelina Jolie underwent a double mastectomy procedure -- the removal of both of her breasts -- in order to minimize her risk of breast cancer ... the actress revealed.


http://www.tmz.com/2013/05/14/angelina-jolie-double-mastectomy-breast-cancer/

http://www.pinklotusbreastcenter.com/

Good for her! This was the best decision for her life, it seems.

It's too bad, though, that the testing she underwent is too expensive for the average woman, and many times, is not covered by insurance (~$3,000, I read).

But I applaud her for speaking about this, and bring it out in the open; putting a positive light on the procedure (taking the "scare" factor out of it.)

In her shoes, I would do the exact same thing. They're only *advertiser censored*. They don't define me. I'm much deeper than that.

I agree oh_gal. Didnt her mother die of breast cancer at a young age?

She is smart to remove that risk from her own life. She has 6 children to raise and care for. Kids have a way of changing our priorities dont they?

Her mother passed in 2007 of ovarian cancer.

I applaud her move... one less cancer factor in her life. She is extremely lucky to be in the position to be proactive.

I was at my friend's house last week, taking care of her after a mastectomy.

I wish she had known about Angelina Jolie before her operation, I think it would have helped with the "fear factor."

I am so glad AJ shared her plight with the public, it will certainly help a lot of women.

Other celebrities who have tested positive for the BRCA-1 or BRCA-2 mutation:

Christina Applegate
Sharon Osbourne
Camille Grammer
Kara DioGuardi

Angelina Jolie's mother died of ovarian cancer, also a high risk cancer with the mutation of the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene.

Maybe Angelina had her ovaries removed also and didn't tell that part, but she has retained her ovaries, why would she deem this an acceptable risk?
She is at an enormously high risk for developing ovarian cancer due to the gene mutation and ovarian cancer in her mother's medical history. There is no definitive screening method for early detection of ovarian cancer and as we know, it is one of the most deadly cancers due to the difficulty of early detection as well as very poor surgery/ chemotherapy results.

I've been down this road myself, so I know how hard the decisions are to make to remove reproductive capabilities in a 30 something year old woman. I also know how horrific ovarian cancer is. I hope Angelina made the right decision and I wish the best for her continued health.

SeekingJana said:

Angelina Jolie's mother died of ovarian cancer, also a high risk cancer with the mutation of the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene.

Maybe Angelina had her ovaries removed also and didn't tell that part, but she has retained her ovaries, why would she deem this an acceptable risk?
She is at an enormously high risk for developing ovarian cancer due to the gene mutation and ovarian cancer in her mother's medical history. There is no definitive screening method for early detection of ovarian cancer and as we know, it is one of the most deadly cancers due to the difficulty of early detection as well as very poor surgery/ chemotherapy results.

I've been down this road myself, so I know how hard the decisions are to make to remove reproductive capabilities in a 30 something year old woman. I also know how horrific ovarian cancer is. I hope Angelina made the right decision and I wish the best for her continued health.

Click to expand...

Didn't she say that this is the first step? She may well indeed have a full hysterectomy in the near future.

She said that her mother got to live long enough to see her first grandchild, but AJ also had two adopted children at that time, so her mother lived long enough to meet three of her grandchildren.

SeekingJana said:

Angelina Jolie's mother died of ovarian cancer, also a high risk cancer with the mutation of the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene.

Maybe Angelina had her ovaries removed also and didn't tell that part, but she has retained her ovaries, why would she deem this an acceptable risk?
She is at an enormously high risk for developing ovarian cancer due to the gene mutation and ovarian cancer in her mother's medical history. There is no definitive screening method for early detection of ovarian cancer and as we know, it is one of the most deadly cancers due to the difficulty of early detection as well as very poor surgery/ chemotherapy results.

I've been down this road myself, so I know how hard the decisions are to make to remove reproductive capabilities in a 30 something year old woman. I also know how horrific ovarian cancer is. I hope Angelina made the right decision and I wish the best for her continued health.

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Perhaps she wants another child - she might be willing to take this risk, as mums are.

It is not really going to help her much, she has the defective genes, she can't change that.

A better strategy is to be aware and be vigilant since she has high risk of cancer. Cutting off body parts and then thinking you are OK doesn't seem like a winning proposition to me.

There is nothing that says you can't have prophylactic surgery and be vigilant at the same time. It is not a magic cure and after you've had had a prophylactic mastectomy you can still get develop skin cancer, colon cancer etc. or any other dangerous diseases but I think it is a generally accepted fact that it is associated with a significant reduction of breast cancer risk.

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRCA_mutation"]BRCA mutation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

The removal of ovaries has more side effects than a mastectomy, particularly in a woman who is not in her menopause yet so I can understand why people would choose to have a mastectomy first.

SeekingJana said:

Angelina Jolie's mother died of ovarian cancer, also a high risk cancer with the mutation of the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene.

Maybe Angelina had her ovaries removed also and didn't tell that part, but she has retained her ovaries, why would she deem this an acceptable risk?
She is at an enormously high risk for developing ovarian cancer due to the gene mutation and ovarian cancer in her mother's medical history. There is no definitive screening method for early detection of ovarian cancer and as we know, it is one of the most deadly cancers due to the difficulty of early detection as well as very poor surgery/ chemotherapy results.

I've been down this road myself, so I know how hard the decisions are to make to remove reproductive capabilities in a 30 something year old woman. I also know how horrific ovarian cancer is. I hope Angelina made the right decision and I wish the best for her continued health.

Click to expand...

With her mother dying from ovarian cancer and her positive BRCA1 test, her risk of breast cancer was 87%. Having the double mastectomy cut her risk of breast cancer to 5%. Her ovarian cancer risk is 50% and she addressed this in the article she wrote: “I started with the breasts, as my risk of breast cancer is higher than my risk of ovarian cancer, and the surgery is more complex."

I admire her for exploring her options and making an informed decision. When I found a large lump in my breast and went to see the doctor I walked in and said "I have a lump. If it's a nasty one I want a double mastectomy, I don't want to muck around with less invasive procedures" and the dr was very supportive. My lump turned out to be a fibroadenoma so I didn't have to go down that road.

Donjeta said:

There is nothing that says you can't have prophylactic surgery and be vigilant at the same time. It is not a magic cure and after you've had had a prophylactic mastectomy you can still get develop skin cancer, colon cancer etc. or any other dangerous diseases but I think it is a generally accepted fact that it is associated with a significant reduction of breast cancer risk.

BRCA mutation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The removal of ovaries has more side effects than a mastectomy, particularly in a woman who is not in her menopause yet so I can understand why people would choose to have a mastectomy first.

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Detecting and treating cancer in breast tissue is a lot easier than other organs though. So, basically she traded off a risk that is easy to detect and intercept, but the harder cancers are still there. The risk for those might be a bit lower than that for breast cancer, but they are still very high.

In other words, her overall probability of dieing from cancer (as opposed to getting it), is not being changed much, assuming that she remains vigilant.

Should women get the gene test if their mother or grandmother passed from ovarian cancer? My Mother in law died of that about 20 years ago and no mention of a gene defect. Or, is thd test something we all need but can't afford?

This story is so upsetting

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/...ouble-mastectomy/story-e6freoof-1226643701662

In 2007, long before Angelina Jolie's preventative surgery, three sisters tested positive for BRCA2, a gene disorder that brings an 80 per cent risk of developing breast or ovarian cancer.

Eldest sister Chrissy Keepence and middle sister Veronica Neave both acted quickly to have hysterectomies and their breasts removed.

But Elisha, only 30 at the time, decided to wait to have more children - a decision that will cost her life.

Now 34, Elisha is dying from a rare and aggressive cancer that started in her ovaries in March last year.

Chrissy said the thought of losing her sister was heartbreaking, but she hoped telling her story would encourage others to act.

"My baby sister has stage-4 fatal ovarian cancer - she never had the chance to act, she waited too long," Chrissy said.

"I am so happy that Angelina Jolie has come out to make people aware.

"If you're armed with knowledge, you can do something. We thought Elisha had more time - she was young and historically in our family the cancer didn't hit until the late 40s, but we were wrong."

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/angelina-jolie-to-have-ovaries-removed/1/271435.html

This article says she will have her ovaries removed, but it's not confirmed.

Tugela said:

Detecting and treating cancer in breast tissue is a lot easier than other organs though. So, basically she traded off a risk that is easy to detect and intercept, but the harder cancers are still there. The risk for those might be a bit lower than that for breast cancer, but they are still very high.

In other words, her overall probability of dieing from cancer (as opposed to getting it), is not being changed much, assuming that she remains vigilant.

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Do you care to share your statistics?

This article says that a prophylactic mastectomy helps young women with the mutation gain in life expectancy from 3 to 5 years. It's an average, meaning that some women will benefit little or none from the surgery but some who manage to avoid the breast cancer they would otherwise have got and don't get any other lethal cancer may live a lot longer than that.

I think I would take those odds if ever in that situation.

We calculated that, on average, 30-year-old women who carry BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations gain from 2.9 to 5.3 years of life expectancy from prophylactic mastectomy and from 0.3 to 1.7 years of life expectancy from prophylactic oophorectomy, depending on their cumulative risk of cancer. Gains in life expectancy decline with age at the time of prophylactic surgery and are minimal for 60-year-old women. Among 30-year-old women, oophorectomy may be delayed 10 years with little loss of life expectancy.

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(It is an old article from 1997 and I expect some changes have occurred in cancer survival rates since then. )

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199705153362022

SophieRose said:

Didn't she say that this is the first step? She may well indeed have a full hysterectomy in the near future.

She said that her mother got to live long enough to see her first grandchild, but AJ also had two adopted children at that time, so her mother lived long enough to meet three of her grandchildren.

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According to People mag, AJ is going to have preventative surgery to remove her ovaries.

Bless her and the choices she has made for herself and her future. Especially her children.

People Magazine reports that Jolie will have her ovaries removed to cancel out that risk. It is common for doctors to recommend that female patients have the procedure after age 40 or when a woman is finished having children because ovarian cancer is common yet preventable.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/05/15/angelina-jolie-to-have-second-preventative-surgery/#ixzz2TSWFzrXH

AJ went from 80% chance of getting Breast cancer to 5% after the manstectomy

My grandmother died of breast cancer at a young age to,no preventive meds back then

My sister who is mentally challenged had it 3 yrs ago & they had to remove her left breast,she has been cancer free ever since

My doctor told me-most times the cancer skips generations,so I prolly won't get it
But my daughter who is 25 has a good chance of getting it
I don't know how true this is,but I am scared for both of us.

I think what AJ did was brave & smart thing to do!!
Wish I could afford the test!!!

SyraKelly said:

AJ went from 80% chance of getting Breast cancer to 5% after the manstectomy

My grandmother died of breast cancer at a young age to,no preventive meds back then

My sister who is mentally challenged had it 3 yrs ago & they had to remove her left breast,she has been cancer free ever since

My doctor told me-most times the cancer skips generations,so I prolly won't get it
But my daughter who is 25 has a good chance of getting it
I don't know how true this is,but I am scared for both of us.

I think what AJ did was brave & smart thing to do!!
Wish I could afford the test!!!

Click to expand...

I don't think that cancer skips generations as a rule. Many cancers are more random or sporadic than genetic, and a person's chances of getting it are not much affected by their relatives, other than to the extent they may share some common risk factors in terms of similar nutrition, the same living environment, similar habits that increase or decrease cancer risk.

In cases of hereditary cancers it may sometimes appear to skip a generation because what is inherited is merely a gene that increases your risk of cancer but it does not mean that you will definitely get the disease. In any family, it is quite possible that some generations will be lucky and not get it, and others are more unlucky. But once someone has the mutation, the effects of the gene are not dependent on whether or not there were any diseases in the previous generations.

Diseases that truly skip generations are usually inherited so that heterozygous carriers don't get sick but if some of their descendants get the same mutation from both parents (homozygous) they will get the disease, or in the X chromosome so that boys who only have one X chromosome are ill and their mothers and daughters are just carriers because they have two X chromosomes.

Then there are of course some diseases that may appear to "skip a generation" because there are only males or females in a generation and the risk is different in males and females. Breast cancer is more common in women and no women have ever died of prostate cancer that I know of, that sort of thing.

Supposing for a moment that your grandmother's and sister's cancer was hereditary, it does not really make sense to me to say that your daughter has a greater chance of getting the same mutation than you. This is because your daughter is a generation farther from your grandmother than you are. There is a chance that you did not inherit the mutation from your parent even if your sister did. If you did not, your daughter hasn't got it either. Even if you did inherit the mutation from your parent, there is still a chance that your daughter did not inherit it from you and does not have it. (This is assuming that the gene is just on your grandmother's side of the family and any of the spouses didn't have it.)