Breast Cancer Inside Out

«Ambitious in its forms and disciplinary insights, this is health humanities writing of real value. An accessible, rich and real range of stories tells us what it is like to experience breast cancer. This book is for patients, clinicians and people who live close to this condition - and that really means all of us.» (Professor Jane Macnaughton, Institute for Medical Humanities, Durham University)
«This is a wonderful collection of essays describing every aspect of breast cancer care, written by patients and the people who treat them. It is full of warmth, empathy and honesty, and will gently guide anyone through a diagnosis of breast cancer.» (Dr. Liz O-Riordan, author of The Complete Guide to Breast Cancer)
This book offers a 360° look at breast cancer from individuals who have intimate understanding of and experience with it: patients who have lived or are living with the disease; healthcare providers whose perspectives patients and families rarely get to know; and researchers and scholars who examine breast cancer through various scientific and cultural lenses. Here you will meet 33 individuals from the UK and US who provide both factual information and personal insights in different forms: historical overview, personal essay, interview, play script, poem, interpersonal vignette, practical guidelines, comic, mixed-media photography exhibit and scholarly analysis.
Breast cancer changes lives. This book is meant to be a single go-to source for people who want to understand more fully and clearly the lived experience of breast cancer - what those who know it best think and do and feel.

Kimberly R. Myers, M.A., Ph.D., is Professor of Humanities and Medicine and Distinguished Educator at Penn State College of Medicine, and Program Director of Schwartz Center Rounds for the Penn State Cancer Institute. Dr. Myers- scholarship focuses on sociocultural dimensions of illness, illness narratives, medical education and graphic medicine, and she has published in professional journals including Journal of the American Medical Association, British Medical Journal, American Medical Association Journal of Ethics, Annals of Internal Medicine, Literature and Medicine and Academic Medicine as well as lay periodicals including The Chronicle of Higher Education and The Atlantic. She is author or editor of six books.

CONTENTS: Part I A Trajectory of Breast Cancer: Diagnosis, Treatment and Beyond - Kimberly R. Myers/Julie A. Mack: When the Patient Knows What the Doctor Does Not (Yet) Know - Mark Stout/Lynn Fantom: A Step-by-Step Guide through Breast Cancer Diagnosis and Radiation - Gordon L. Kauffman, Jr.: Communion - Lisa Katz: Reconstruction - John D. Potochny: Gauging Too Much Information: Discussing a Young Mother's Options for Reconstructive Surgery - Kate Jollie: Flashpoints: Wisdom from the Trenches - Kevin B. Knopf: Another Catcher in the Rye: Oncology Care at the County Hospital - David Carnish: Reflections on Solidarity - Ian R. Ross: When Chaos Comes: The Role of a Hospitalist - Eliana V. Hempel: Best-Laid Plans: When Follow-Up Fails - Jeffrey M. Kowaleski: Always on Your Side: What All Patients Should Know about Palliative Care - George R. Simms: How Hospice Can Heal - Mark L. Hunnicutt: A Steward of Suffering: One Man's Story of Breast Cancer - Part II Enhancing Your Health by Honoring Your Self - Michael Hayes: Our Many Teachers: Wisdom for Psychological Health during Breast Cancer - Debra Rex George/Daniel R. George: All You Need Is Love ... and Research: A Mother-Son Team Navigate a Non-Aggressive Approach to Breast Cancer - Kathryn H. Schmitz: I Promise You Will Feel Better: The Importance of Exercising During and After Cancer Treatment - Elizabeth Reid: Food as Medicine: How to Eat During and After Treatment for Breast Cancer - Amy Holiday: A Future on Ice - Elva J. Winter: Intimacy and Sexuality in the Context of Breast Cancer - Part III Shaping Cancer, (Re)Shaping Self - Deborah Bowman: On Being Constant and Changed: Breast Cancer in Six Acts - Johanna Shapiro: Women's Breast Cancer Poetry: Voice, Identity, Contingency and Death - Jennifer Hayden: Under the Birdcage - Kimberly R. Myers: Breast Cancer Comics in the Classroom and the Clinic - Rachel O'Connor: A Curator's Interpretation of Edges of Light - Kimberly R. Myers/Wendy Palmer: Edges of Light: Images of Breast Transformation - Lisa Katz: The Form - Part IV Breast Cancer over Time: Evolutions in Understandings, Representations, Tools and Treatments - Siobhan Conaty: Milestones in the Depiction of Breasts and Breast Cancer in Art History - Lisa Katz: Breast Art - Michael Baum: An Historical Overview of Breast Cancer and Its Treatments - Henry Wagner: Radiation Therapy: Evolutions in Treatment, Consultations in Clinic - Michael Baum: Understanding How Cancer Behaves: Implications for Paradigm Shifts in Treatment - Maria J. Baker: Genetic Counseling and Testing for Hereditary Breast Cancer: A Genetic Counselor's Perspective - Victoria O'Donnell: The Marketing of Metastatic Breast Cancer: A Cultural Analysis of the Ibrance Commercial - Ariane B. Anderson: The New Normal: Metastatic Breast Cancer Experiences of Survivor Identity - Lisa Katz: Support Group.