Family Medicine Educates East Side Residents about Breast Cancer
Laurene Tumiel-Berhalter, PhD
Published November 12, 2012 This content is archived.
Story based on news release by Ellen Goldbaum
Patient Voices Network, a partnership between the Department of Family Medicine’s Primary Care Research Institute (PCRI) and Jericho Road Ministries, recently held a free breast cancer awareness event on Buffalo’s East Side.
Free Mammograms Highlighted Masten Park Event
The Oct. 13 gathering in Masten Park included mammograms offered by the Western New York Breast Health Mobile Mammography Unit, consultations with health care providers and a 1.6-mile awareness walk.
“Everyone knows what the pink ribbon means, but to really reach people on Buffalo’s East Side, we needed to put an event right in the community,” says Laurene Tumiel-Berhalter, PhD, associate professor of family medicine and the PCRI’s director of community translational research.
Grants from the Western New York affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure and the New York State Division of Science, Technology and Innovation funded the event.
Network Promotes Minority Health Care
Patient Voices Network consists of low-income, minority patients with chronic illness who work together to improve primary care and to boost cancer screenings at the network’s practice partners, Jericho Road Family Practice and UBMD Family Medicine at Jefferson.
Tumiel-Berhalter established the network in 2010 with a grant from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities.
Awareness Critical for African-Americans
Breast cancer education in minority communities is urgently needed, Tumiel-Berhalter says, because it’s the cancer most likely to afflict African-American women and the second most common cause of cancer death among this group.
African-American women have a higher incidence rate of breast cancer before the age of 40. They’re more likely to die from breast cancer than non-Hispanic, white women.