Why are you concerned about medical misdiagnosis?

In America, more than 12 million people are misdiagnosed each year. I experienced this when I was misdiagnosed and mistreated for a condition I didn’t have. It took two years before I was diagnosed correctly, with uterine cancer.

I think we need to change from being patients into medical consumers. We need to be better partners with our physicians and be more proactive. Knowledge is power, and you can’t turn the doctor into a god—because you care about you the most. When you least feel like it, you have to be strong for yourself.

“It took two years before I was diagnosed correctly, with uterine cancer.”

Why is Cancer Schmancer focusing on early detection and prevention?

You may have heard, “If you catch it on arrival, 95 percent survival.” Well, we want to help women reduce their cancer risk and empower them with information about “early warning whispers,” and tests that may not be on the menu at the doctor’s office. Early warnings of ovarian cancer include pelvic pain, abdominal swelling, backache and unintentional weight gain or loss.

How can women be proactive about prevention?

Children today are not anticipated to live as long as their parents, and babies are being born pre-polluted. Almost 95 percent of cancers are environmentally stimulated, so Cancer Schmancer developed a prevention program called Detox Your Home. Our homes are the environment we spend the most time in and have the most control over.

I challenge people to look at things like food, personal care items and gardening products so they can reduce cancer risk and autoimmune problems for their families and pets. What we are accepting as normal chronic illness should not be acceptable; it is not sustainable.

But we can turn this around through purchasing power. We deserve to buy products that are safe. It behooves us to change our shopping habits and dictate trends while we do it.