For some reason I just have become completely competitive on facebook to recruit folks for a great cause. Usually I guess I only started late and so there was no way to be a big recruit person, but on the “Let us Race For The Cure” I got in early and I am now the second best recruit there.
I invited a few slowtwitch folks already, but clearly most folks here are not my friends on facebook. So those of you on facebook who believe in the Race for the Cure why don’t you sign up for that cause. Link below.
I have a question, people hate big drug companies and feel they are taking advantage of the consumer, yet they are willing to donate all this money to them I don’t get it. Also, wouldn’t it be more beneficial to promote things that would actually reduce breast cancer? Stop smoking, stop drinking, stop drinking milk, don’t ride in elevators, don’t get lots of mammogramms, etc that actually reduce the chance of breast cancer and the onset of it then give money to some big conglomerate?
Don’t mean to point you out personally but I don’t understand why people join these groups to begin with. I think it is great to get people together and have support groups and what not yet they do nothing IMO to actually stop breast cancer when there are so many things that can be done and information that can be spread to actually help people.
**The idea behind the Komen Race for the Cure is to raise awareness for the disease and to actually help people with tips on healthy living etc. **
I keep hearing how these races are set up to raise awareness of cancer but is there anyone who hasn’t heard of cancer?
I don’t have a problem with some agencies set up to “raise awareness” but after working on the inside for years in one of the large organizations, I have become disillusioned with the way things operate. Way too much of the money is spent on paying salaries and administrative costs instead of going to those who could actually find a cure. I also became disillusioned with Corporations attaching their name to fund raisers. The “X Company raise for the Cure” is little more than an advertising campaign to benefit the Company. All of the agencies claim their administration costs are lower than everyone else’s but having worked with them in the accounting field, I realize there are a lot of ways to reduce those costs without actually reducing them. It’s pretty easy to allocate money from administration to R&D, it takes a simple journal entry.
Since the 1980’s, when I started getting involved, there have been literally billions of dollars raised but at some point, you have to ask what has been accomplished? I know the survival rates have improved but the incidents of cancer are going up. In Canada, organizations like the Terry Fox Foundation, Find a Cure, Susan Komen etc., etc have done a great job of “raising awareness” but where are the results? I think it’s important that people start asking some tough questions of these organizations.
I am not anti-cancer, both of my parents died of the disease but my family and I have become disillusioned about the process. We found an actual research facility and met with the President and started donating directly to them, rather than using a middle man agency and we feel better about it. We have asked for and obtain their quarterly financial statements to ensure the money is being spent appropriately. The President advised us that he wished more people did this because he also feels so many with good intentions are wasting their money.
I don’t know a lot about Komen and don’t want to isolate them but when you actively go out to recruit, remember that even though it is important to you and to many others, there are thousands of agencies competing for funds and people can’t support them all.
rates have gone up because of detection bias - starting screening earlier. Survival rates have NOT increased again, it is lead time bias. There was a study just published that two thirds of breast cancer patients are treated too aggressively.
breast and prostate cancer have not made too much headway - you either die with it or from it and what we do as physicians does not affect that much. What I mean is that if you have an aggressive form of the cancer, we throw all sorts of things at you and MAYBE you gain a few months but you die anyway. If you have a non aggressive form we throw all sorts of things at you and pat ourselves on the back that we cured you and you might have died with it ultimately regardless.
I do the Race for the Cure in Columbus, OH every year and it is one of my favorite races of the year. It’s an event fueled by estrogen rather than testosterone. More than 40,000 participants in the Columbus event. It brings together a quite diverse group of people. A race doesn’t have to be 140 miles to inspire, change lives and bring tears.
I’m sure the points made in the earlier posts about raising money for cancer are valid, but the entry fee for the Race for the Cure is quite reasonable so I have no hesitation about entering the event. The positive energy I feel that morning definitely outweighs my normal cynicism about such things.
I have been to a few Race for the Cure events and to see the numbers of survivers go to the front after the run/walk is quite impressive. Usually they go in groups based on how long they have survived. By the time the people go to the front who have 20 + years the crowd goes crazy.
