Breast Cancer

May 11, 2021 WASHINGTON — U.S. Representatives Judy Chu (CA-27) and Jackie Walorski (IN-2) today re-introduced legislation to ensure breast cancer patients and survivors who have experienced a mastectomy are able to access custom breast prosthetics under Medicare. The Breast Cancer Patient Equity Act would provide coverage for custom fabricated breast prostheses, the only human body part not currently covered by Medicare, to the more than 144,000 women who undergo mastectomies annually. “Breast

By: Nikki Jensen, Vice President, Essentially Women The Advisory Committee on Breast Cancer in Young Women (ACBCYW) is now accepting nominations to create educational initiatives for young women diagnosed with breast cancer. These initiatives are intended to provide advice and guidance to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Assistant Secretary for Health, HHS and Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Guidance may be in the form of public and

By: Brittney Gray, Founder and Owner, Revamped Beauty Revamped Beauty is a 501c3 public charitable organization in Birmingham, Alabama. Our mission is to empower men and women to live their most beautiful lives in the face of a breast cancer diagnosis by providing access to specialized medical equipment and services. Revamped Beauty works in our community to spread awareness of the obstacles that patients endure after receiving a breast cancer diagnosis. We focus on providing resources that help

October was Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and we celebrated by hosting a podcast and interviewing Lori Miller, manager at Naturally Yours, an Essentially Women member in Illinois, as well as Jamie Lee, who is not only a breast cancer survivor but a business owner, a model who has walked the runway, and a force to be reckoned with. We wanted to highlight the strong, amazing women who impact this industry every day and who have not only conquered breast cancer, but have dominated it. You can listen

Due to the COVID-19 public health emergency, Washington, D.C. and progress on many legislative issues came to a halt. The country is beginning to open back up and non-emergent surgeries are taking place again. Because of COVID-19, now more than ever women will be looking for lower risk and non-surgical options after a mastectomy. It is incredibly important that breast cancer survivors have all the reconstruction options available to them after mastectomy surgery, whether that be surgical reconstruction,

Cure Today recently published an article that highlighted the results of a nationwide study presented during a 2020 ASCO Virtual Scientific Program press briefing.These results revealed that the death rate from cancer dropped more in states that expanded Medicaid coverage than those that didn’t following the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010. According to Cure Today, authors of this study say it was the first of its kind to examine cancer mortality in the wake of

The House of Representatives and Senate are both in session on April 15, 2020. Let’s make our voices heard and call our senators and representatives asking them to sign on to support S. 562/H.R. 1370, the Breast Cancer Patient Equity Act. The breast is one of the only body parts not covered by Medicare as a custom prosthetic replacement! Women deserve to make the choice for themselves. Please note, the call-in day that was scheduled on April 1, 2020 will now take place April 15, 2020 due

Update 3/31/20: Due to Coronavirus, the scheduled LHD Call-In has been postponed.  This was the activity highlighted in the recent Essential Advantage newsletter asking people to call their legislators to ask for support of The Breast Cancer Patient Equity Act, H.R. 1370/S. 562.  The original date referenced in the newsletter and our Facebook page was April 1st.  In the past week, we rescheduled for April 15th due to most Capitol buildings

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a supplemental new drug application for Nerlynx (neratinib) in combination with Xeloda (capecitabine) for the treatment of adult patients with advanced or metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer who have previously received two or more anti-HER2 based therapies in the metastatic setting.  According to Cure Today, the approval comes off the heels of the phase 3 NALA trial that looked at the efficacy of Nerlynx in combination with Xeloda, which

A recent study from Medscape has found that alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking are associated with an increased risk of breast cancer (BC), but it is unclear whether these associations vary by a woman's familial BC risk.  The conclusion found was that moderate alcohol intake was associated with increased BC risk, particularly for women with ER-positive BC, but only for those at lower predicted familial BC risk (5-year BOADICEA < 1.25). For women with a high FRP (5-year BOADICEA