By Cheryl Jahn

Cancer Screening Lacking For First Nations Women

Mar 7, 2018 | 1:25 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – “Always in the back of your head, right? Do I have it? Do I have it? Because you think, cancer and death. You know what I mean?”

That is how Pearl Lalonde began her cancer journey in May of 2014 after a routine mammogram. Her cancer was caught early and, today, she is a survivor because of it. But through the course of her treatment at the BC Cancer Agency Centre for the North, she noticed something. The lack of First Nations women getting treatment.  And, in many ways, she understands, it’s a cultural issue.

“They’re scared to deal with it.  I never talked about it for a long time,” says Lalonde. “I don’t what part of that is but, like residential schools. My mother was in a residential school. Horrible, horrible stories. She would never talk about it. Because if you talked about it, you had to deal with it.”

It’s an issue identified recently by the BC Cancer Agency.

“We know that there’s decreased uptake of screening in First Nations communities. Some good examples are women’s cancers, so cervical cancer screening and breast cancer screening,” says Dr. Rob Olson, Lead Oncologist for the BC Cancer Agency Centre for the North. “And we’ve actually seen some negative outcomes as a result of that.”

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But the challenge is to help clear that cultural hurdle. And that’s where Lalonde wants to help. She wants to help First Nations women to understand that early detection saves lives. 

“You know the worst thing of it all?  You have to tell your family. Phoning my daughter and her heartbreak. That was hard,” she recalls tearfully. “I just think of the horror in her voice when I told her I have cancer. Devastated.”

And Dr. Olson agrees. Ambassadors like Pearl Lalonde are exactly the key to helping.