By Angeline Olschewski

December 10, 2007 | Two days before her 24th birthday, Cassidy Bull discovered a lump in her left breast. She was leaving town for a week and didn't have time to get it checked, so she brushed it off telling herself, "Breasts can be lumpy." But she knew. This lump was different.

"This felt definitely like something," Bull said.

When she returned home, she went to the student wellness center where she was examined and told it was likely a normal cyst or lump that young women get. The doctor suggested she could wait a month to see if it went away, or she could get an ultrasound at the hospital.

Bull opted for the ultrasound, which came back inconclusive. She followed that up with a needle biopsy, which came back inconclusive.

"It was ... kind of -- this is scary; it's going to be something serious," Bull said, "even though every doctor we went to kind of assured me that 90 percent chance it was something that was just a cyst or fibrous mass of some sort."

Finally she was referred to a breast cancer surgeon in Salt Lake City for a lumpectomy, a less invasive procedure than mastectomy, and the whole mass was removed.

"She [the surgeon] pretty much knew when she took it out that it was cancerous," Bull said. "She said she didn't get clear margins on the test, which meant there were still malignant cells left after she took out the initial lump, so I'd have to go back in eventually and have another surgery."

Tests diagnosed her with a form of breast cancer affecting only 5 percent of women with breast cancer and typically seen in women over 65 years of age or minorities, "which none of those things I am," Bull laughed.

"It was a good prognosis, except my age was the only downfall," she said. "Because I am young they wanted to make sure it didn't come back, so that's why everyone recommended a very aggressive chemotherapy regimen as well as radiation."

Bull had to decide between another lumpectomy and a mastectomy. She made several visits to a Salt Lake City breast clinic that orchestrates meetings with multiple specialists including: a social worker, a geneticist, a radiation therapist, a medical oncologist and a general surgeon.

After many consultations, Bull chose the lumpectomy, followed by chemotherapy and radiation. Radiation treatment is not available in Cache Valley and will require her to travel to Ogden or Salt Lake City every day for six weeks. There is a chance that she will be too sick or too tired to drive herself, so someone will have to take her to McKay Dee Hospital.

By summer of 2008, this commute will no longer be necessary for Cache Valley residents. Logan Regional Hospital (LRH) is in the process of building a new cancer treatment center on the 600 East side of the hospital.

"A great benefit of the new center is that it will allow cancer patients and their families to stay close to home for the best radiation oncology treatment available," said Debbie Ostrander, public relations spokeswoman for LRH. "Previously patients have had to travel to Ogden or Salt Lake City to receive radiation therapy.

"The treatment takes only a few minutes, but the drive can take half a day or more round-trip," Ostrander added. "Having this treatment available close to home will be a real blessing for these people.

"Everything will be state of the art," said Ostrander. "The heart of the cancer treatment center will be a linear accelerator which provides radiation oncology therapy. The linear accelerator has the latest technology available to effectively treat tumors in any part of the body and to help minimize side effects of radiation therapy."

In addition to the medical oncologist, surgeons, and other physicians currently treating cancer patients in Cache Valley, two Huntsman-Intermountain radiation oncologists from Ogden will join the new center. Gary Whipple, M.D., and Leslye Ingersoll, M.D., along with a full-time oncology nurse and therapy staff will bring their services to LRH's cancer treatment center.

Beth Walden, a resident of Logan who recently finished her radiation treatment for breast cancer at McKay Dee Hospital, is excited about the potential offerings of a cancer treatment center here in Cache Valley.

"It will be nice for local patients to have choices," Walden said. "Patients have a better chance of good outcomes when they can match their health providers' personal styles with their own."

Cassidy Bull has been asked to help start a cancer care panel here similar to the one she attended in Salt Lake City, which she's excited to do. "Right now they don't have any one center that's focused just on cancer," she said. "So I think the center will be really good."

Walden agrees. "Health involves more than just the body. It also involves the mental, emotional, and spiritual levels. I hope to see support providers also involved in the center. I had to search out a nutritionist. The OT [occupational therapist] that originally spoke with me advocated walking. It worked! I hope that the center will support the whole person."

Ostrander noted that another benefit of the cancer treatment center includes an education center, where patients and the public will have access to the latest cancer information and research on the latest treatment results.

"Cancer patients can also participate in national clinical trials that gather data on the latest methods for cancer treatment with the goal to find a cure for cancer," Ostrander added.

According to the Centers for Disease Control Web site, female breast cancer is the second most prevalent cancer in Utah; prostate cancer is the first. In 2003, 108.6 out of every 100,000 women in Utah were diagnosed with breast cancer. That same year, 23.7 out of every 100,000 women died from breast cancer. The site also states that early detection leads to early intervention and is the best way to increase the chance of survival.

"Now that I'm going through cancer and because I'm so young, I'm a big proponent of [self-checks]." Bull suggested, "At least once a month that women check their own breasts. I think it's so important that women really take an active role in knowing their body and checking their breasts and being aware if there are changes."

As for her prognosis, so far everything is going well. She noted the hardest thing has been the side effects. "I feel under the weather a lot," she explained. Recently Bull started her second course of chemotherapy and hopes the side effects diminish.

Mostly, she is looking forward to aiding the new center in putting together patient support services. "There are a lot of support groups in Salt Lake City and here there aren't any that I've found," she said.

"I've talked to a few people and we're going to try and start a support group," Bull said. "It's nice to talk to friends and family, but if you can talk to someone that's gone through it or is going through it, I think that's helpful on the emotional side, as well as knowing what to expect.

"Once we get [the cancer center] up and running, people will not have to travel so far to get good advice and recommendations and have different options available to them in dealing with their cancer," she said. "Everyone has a loved one who has been affected by cancer or will be affected by cancer, and now through the creation of this new cancer center, support and medical treatment will be available close to home."

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