FORMER news reader Tracey Spicer is baring all in a new video encouraging women to check their breasts for cancer.
Eight members of her extended family have died of cancer and the 48 year old mother of two may have a gene mutation that makes her susceptible to the disease.
To encourage more women to check their breasts she takes off her top in a new video “Letstalkaboutbreasts” and is filmed having a breast examination and a breast scan.
“On the first day of filming I’d never met the crew and the first thing I had to do was take my top off and have a doctor poke my boobs,” she says.
“I did it because it was important, I’ve got to the age where I don’t give a damn what people think of me, whatever is the most effective way to get the message across I’ll do it,” she says.
One of Tracey’s best friends was diagnosed with breast cancer last year and it made her realise she didn’t know her own risk factors.
It had been seven years since she had last had a mammogram that had resulted in a false positive scare.
“And I’m one of those women at higher risk, there is a strong risk of cancer on one side of my family,” she says.
Tracey’s mother died of pancreatic cancer at age 52, a week later her aunt was diagnosed with lung cancer, her grandmother died of cancer in her thirties, her uncle died from leukaemia at the age of 14, other family members also had cancer.
Back then technology was not as advanced and genetic links to cancer weren’t recognised.
Tracey is now planning to have a test for the BRACA 1 and 2 genes which have been linked to pancreatic cancer, they are also implicated in around 5-10 per cent of breast cancers.
The Youtube video shows women talking with Tracey about their thoughts on breast cancer risk and screening.
Almost half the women over the age of 50 who are eligible for a free breast screendon’t take up the opportunity even though it could save their life.
When breast cancer is detected early 96 per cent of women will still be alive five years later.
49 year old Annette Odgers who also appears in the video was pregnant when she discovered she had an aggressive form of breast cancer.
She had to make a difficult choice about continuing with her pregnancy or fighting her cancer.
“I was told to survive I had to abort the baby,” she says.
“My husband Darrin and I discussed it and he said to me if I wasn’t there the family unity was broken anyway,” she told News Corp.
“Still, today, I choke up when I think about it,” she says.
The night Annette was booked into hospital for the abortion she suffered a miscarriage and she went on to have a second child after her cancer treatment was over.
Tracey Spicer has a 3D mammogram which takes images of the breast in slices, unlike a traditional 2D mammogram
Professor Mary Rickard Chief Radiologist at Sydney Breast Clinic says studies have shown this new technology picks up 27 per cent more cancers and also reduces by 27 per cent the number of women called back for further testing.
“The problem with a single 2D image is cancers may be obscured by tissue and at times two bits of healthy tissue on top of each other can look like a cancer,” she says.
Women are urged to examine their own breasts to check for lumps once a month and women over the age of 50 are eligible for a free mammogram.
It is estimated that around 8 deaths from breast cancer will be prevented for every 1000 women screened every two years from age 50 to age 74, based on evaluation of mammographic screening in Australia.
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