American Indian cancer statistics under reported

[Thunderwolf, MSN, RN]

On the surface, American Indian mortality rates from cancer appear low.

For example breast cancer accounts for 25 out of every 100,000 deaths in the white population. Among American Indians, it accounts for only 12.1 out of every 100,000 deaths.

Figures such as these promote a false sense of security said Judith Salmon Kauer, assistant professor of medicine and a consultant in medical oncology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. Choctaw and Cherokee, she is one of only two American Indian oncologists in the United States.

"Cancer used to be thought of as uncommon among American Indians, but when I was affiliated with the Indians Into Medicine program at the University of North Dakota in Bismarck several years ago, my sense was that we were seeing a lot of cancer," Kauer said. "I worked on cancer control with Indian Health Service in Aberdeen to clean up the data and, we discovered that there indeed was a lot more cancer among our people than was previously reported."

Read the entire article here:

http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=2508

This hits home for me. My Grandmother was 1/2 Cherokee.

She died of breast cancer, but refused to be treated. She was an LPN and knew better. But, she could not bring herself to be treated in the hospital.