Former Athlete and Lung Cancer Advocate Talks About Lung Cancer Screening
Former Athlete and Lung Cancer Advocate Talks About Lung Cancer Screening
By Tia Carol Jones
November is Lung Cancer Awareness Month. According to the American Cancer Society, lung cancer (small cell and non-small cell) is the second most common cancer in both men and women in the United States (not counting skin cancer). Each year, more people die from lung cancer than of colon, breast, and prostate cancers combined.
In early November, Chris Draft, Founder, President and CEO, of the Chris Draft Family Foundation was travelling across Illinois speaking about the importance of getting screened for lung cancer. Draft, who is a lung cancer advocate lost his wife, Keasha, to lung cancer in 2011. Draft said before his wife passed, she asked their family and friends to support the foundation, which fights for the lung cancer community.
“Team Draft was added in terms of lung cancer work that was really spearheaded by my wife, recognizing that it would take a team of people to transform this community, a team that was already there,” he said. He added that the foundation was bringing its resources, with him as a former NFL player. and figuring out how to bring the resources to lift and empower the community, so that more people could benefit from the change that was happening.
Draft said that it is critically important for people to get screened for lung cancer when they are eligible to get screened.
According to the American Lung Association, if a person is between the ages of 50 years to 80 years (50 to 77 for Medicare), have a 20 pack-year history of smoking -- meaning one pack a day for 20 years, two packs a day for 10 years -- and currently smoke or have quit within the last 15 years, they are considered to be at “high risk” for developing lung cancer and screening is recommended.
“We’ve seen it in breast cancer, we know that when people are able to find their cancer at an early stage, that the survival rates go up dramatically. So, anybody who can benefit from it, we want to encourage all of them to get it done,” he said.
Draft said he also wants to find out what might be holding people back from getting screened for lung cancer and let them know that screenings should be done. He said he knows that it might be scary to screen because they might find something, but he said, it might be even scarier if they find it late. He said finding it early gives people the best chance to survive.
Draft said he wants to get rid of the stigma of lung cancer where people blame smokers who get diagnosed with the disease. He wants people not to blame smokers because the nicotine addiction can be just as harsh as with any other illicit drugs. He said people need to rally around smokers, those who quit and those who are trying to quit.
“We need to rally around our people and make sure there are nodule clinics, we need to rally around people and make sure they get appropriate care, we need to rally around people and make sure they have access to clinical trials,” he said. He added that as people go through their lung cancer journey, they should not have to be part of the health system to understand their diagnosis and treatment. They should be met with and treated with love and have the information they need.
Draft said he has received feedback from people who are grateful for the work the Chris Draft Family Foundation does. He said that if people want things to change, there needs to be an intention around caring for everyone. He said there is hope and things are changing.
For more information about the Chris Draft Family Foundation, visit www.chrisdraftfamilyfoundation.org. For more information about the American Cancer Society, visit www.cancer.org, and visit, www.lung.org, for more information about the American Lung Association.
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