FM Talk 1065 Podcasts
Time for a Check Up Michelle Dean from Southern Cancer Center 9-09-24
[music] This is midday mobile with Sean Sullivan on FM Talk 1065. Welcome back to midday mobile and time for a check up here on FM Talk 1065 and joining us from Southern Cancer Center, Michelle Sanford, nurse practitioner. Good to see you. Thanks for coming in. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Okay. So we're going to get an education like we always do when folks from Southern Cancer Center come in. First up, genetic testing. Now, genetic testing seems to be on every other conversation these days, but in the world of fighting cancer, from your perspective, genetic testing, what is it? We have two different types of genetic testing, but the most common type that people actually come to see us about that may not have cancer, and especially those that do have cancer, is testing them to see if they were born with any genes that predispose them to cancer. So people that are healthy but have a lot of cancer in their family tree can come in and see if they've inherited anything that can predispose them to cancer. And then people who already have cancer can get tested for the same thing. Genes that they were born with, that could have predispose them to getting the cancer that they have. And sometimes we can use those results for treatment options because we do have some treatments that go with some gene mutations. And then we can also use that information to screen them for other cancers that they could be predisposed to. Yeah, no conversation we've had before with doctors from Southern Cancer Center. What you said, there's certain cancer treatments that are for certain cancers, not all, they're not all the same. That's correct. Yes. Everybody's treatment is we have precision medicine now. So even people with the, with breast cancer don't get the same treatment. It's broken down into what type of specific cancer is it? What does it respond to? what markers are on the cancer cell? And do genetics play a role or genetic mutations play a role in it? Because some of the mutations do have a specific treatment that target it. Okay. So if I'm thinking the things you said here, I probably, you know, would want to get this. How do I do it? I mean, do I, do I need to get a referral? What do I do? You do not have to have a referral, so you can actually look at our website and there's a list of in the genetics section, there would be an outline as to what people would qualify for genetic testing. Usually your primary care doctor or if you're a female, you're OBGYN and even your urologist would should have a checklist that can, that you can go through to see if you would qualify for genetic testing. So anybody that really has a specific or a significant family history of cancer in their family, especially breast prostate, pancreatic, ovarian, and colon cancers. So usually if you have somebody who's had cancer under the age of 50 in your family, that is one of those breast ovarian prostate, pancreatic, or colon. If you have two close family members, say a sister and a mother or a mother in an aunt that have the same type of cancer or the same family of cancer. So breast, ovarian, pancreatic, and prostate are related. So if you have somebody who's close to you that had breast cancer and the uncle that had significant prostate cancer, like metastatic to the bone, that would be something that you'd want to ask about genetic testing and that type of person. Okay, how do you all do it, what's the procedure? So we screen you first to make sure that you qualify for testing because we don't want to add any unnecessary co-pays to a person if the test isn't right for them. So we make sure that this test is right for the person. And then we also go through the risks and benefits of testing because there are risks. The risks can be emotional stress of a positive result. But the old ignorance is bliss. Yes, it can be bliss and it can also be stressful too. So we go through each side how it can be stressful to know or it can be stressful not to know. We also do the go over the effects that it could have on your ability to get things like a life insurance. It won't affect your ability to get health insurance, but it could affect the amount of life insurance you could take out in the future or long term care insurance. So we just make sure that you're aware of everything before you go into the testing to make sure that you're ready for it. Okay, Michelle, people want to, they've heard these things you said and said, yeah, I'm probably a candidate for that. How do they get in touch with you? How do they get this process started? They can just call our office number and make an appointment for genetic testing. And then we will send them out an information packet. It usually goes through the email with their text right now and it's all done online if they're able to. And they fill out their family and their health information and they come in to see one of our genetic counselors. Okay, so just if they Google something cancer center, get the phone number, call and say I would like to make an appointment for genetic counseling and we only do genetics for cancers. Okay, all right, very good. Well, we appreciate this and appreciate you being on the show. Thanks, Michelle. (upbeat music)