Breast and prostate cancer often take the media spotlight and have dominated awareness campaigns in the last two decades, but lung cancer actually takes more lives every year than breast, prostate and ovarian cancer combined. For the nearly 70,000 men and women who will succumb to lung cancer this year, November is designated Lung Cancer Awareness Month. Although a significant portion of the new cases are preventable (smoking is the leading cause) many newly diagnosed patients have no such history. Prevention, early diagnosis and research into effective treatments help reduce the mortality rate of cancers — so awareness campaigns help enormously to get the word out.

RESOURCES YOU CAN COUNT ON:

For patients and their families, online resources continue to be of tremendous value for support, education, and advocacy. Here are two highlighted resources with many more in our lung cancer library.

LungCancer.org (www.lungcancer.org) is a service of CancerCare. The signature service of this non-profit support organization is timely information on disease research and treatment as well as a variety of support services, including phone-in information conferences. It’s an easy-to-navigate format with a primer on lung cancer and an updated news section. Their support groups are well run and include counseling, education, financial assistance and practical help provided by trained oncology social workers. Available by phone or online, there are also walk-in services available in the tri-state area.

Lung Cancer Online, ( www.lungcanceronline.org) sponsored by the Lung Cancer Online Foundation, although no-frills in the graphics department, it is a comprehensive library of information about lung cancer treatment, understanding multi-disciplinary care, advice on how to be proactive in discussions with your oncologist, a directory of relevant medical tests and procedures, and resources for support during and after treatment.

For more resources, visit our Cancer Sites Page for Lung Cancer.