Stories about breast cancer generally fall into two categories.
• Tales of hope, told by those fortunate 10 or 20-year survivors, or...
• Sad memories of the last courageous fights, told by the widowers who haven't adjusted to life on their own.
Today, though, there are also the new stories of therapy breakthroughs being told by Dr. Arnold Herskovic, of the Presence St. Mary's Hospital Radiation Therapy Center in Bourbonnais. Employing principles he began studying in the early 1970s, he can now offer an internal breast radiation device custom fitted to each patient, an implant called the five-day SAVI system.
"This is not for every patient, but from my experience, this has produced excellent results for about 25 percent of my patients," he explained, "Yes, there will still be fear, whenever the word cancer is used, but there are so many advances being made."
To that end this product of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago is still developing new tools to wage a war that claims approximately 40,000 American lives each year.
