We Love… Free to Breathe!

For all our talk about lung cancer screening, what we’d love most is to not need screening at all – which is to say, what if… lung cancer were not the threat it is today? This is why we love Free to Breathe!  

Free to Breathe’s mission is to “ensure surviving lung cancer is the expectation, not the exception.” For all the strides being made in the war on cancer, lung cancer lags behind in both survivorship and early detection.  

Contrary to popular belief lung cancer doesn’t just occur in smokers (though smoking does radically increase risk and if you need to quit, here are a few things to know). Lung cancer can also run in families of nonsmokers, can be seen in those affected by secondhand smoke, may result from some environmental/ industrial exposures and may arise in people without specific risks.  

According to scientific studies, “People who have never smoked account for 20,000 – 30,000 lung cancer diagnoses every year.”  

Not only is it a debilitating and potentially deadly disease, lung cancer is typically detected late in the game. Signs and symptoms often show up late, but may include breathing-related issues like coughing up blood or trouble breathing but also back, shoulder or chest pain. See your doctor promptly if you have concerns.   Free to Breathe’s vision is to cut lung cancer deaths in half by 2022. We can’t wait for this to be the reality! We encourage you to like them here too.

Originally published 7/2/14 on diagnosticimagingcenterskc.com.