Treatment Cycle 13 - Day 1

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13 down, 5 to go!

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Hormonal Therapy (Part 3)

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Seth and I spent hours on Friday morning talking through my fears for my treatment, and I cried more than I have at any time during this illness, including at diagnosis. He listened to my concerns and read the articles that I handed him and dried my tears, and ultimately said, "We need better information." I realized that he was right - we didn't need more information, but we needed actual data, not anecdotes. Even the articles from reputable sources were of limited helpfulness when they quoted doctors' opinions rather than facts, and many of them contradicted each other about which side effects were most likely to occur. But then I found the results of a National Cancer Institute study called NSABP P1 , wherein 13,000  women at high risk of getting breast cancer were randomly assigned to receive either tamoxifen or placebo. The primary goal of the trial was to assess the value of tamoxifen in preventing cancer, but it also included  a set of questionnaires to as...
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