After watching Mom die, daughter takes radical steps to keep cancer at bay

Published 12:26 pm Monday, March 29, 2010

Two perfectly healthy sisters underwent complete hysterectomies for preventative maintenance.

One also had her breasts removed.

Both discovered they carried a gene from their mother, who died of cancer. That gene indicated a propensity for developing cancer.

Renee Ummel, 47, a teacher at Voyager Middle School in Mukilteo, helped care for her mother through more than eight years of treatments for ovarian cancer.

I wrote about her mother, Lisa Thacker of Mill Creek, on June 5, 2007, in a column headlined “Joy of dancing helps woman battle cancer.”

Thacker loved to spend afternoons dancing at the Everett and Lynnwood Eagles, Northshore Senior Center in Bothell and Normanna Hall in Everett.

She died one year ago.

A year and a half before her death, she was genetically tested to see if her cancer was hereditary.

“She tested positive, which gave each of us a 50-50 chance of also carrying the mutated gene,” Ummel said. “Out of three daughters, two of us tested positive for the mutation and one was negative.”

Ummel was with her sister, who tested negative, when she received the grim prognosis. After Ummel was told she was positive, she said she wrapped her head around the situation.

Being positive meant the two sisters were “high risk” for both hereditary ovarian and breast cancer. Ummel said if a person carries the gene, called the BRCA 2, a female has an 87 percent chance, by the age of 70, of getting breast cancer. The risk of getting ovarian cancer is 44 percent by the age of 70.

Those statistics were confirmed by Dr. Oliver Batson with The Everett Clinic, which is part of Providence Regional Cancer Partnership.

The sisters, including Denise Furrer, 52, of Arlington, had several choices: Do nothing. Be tested every three months. Do chemotherapy prevention (Tamoxifen) for five years. Remove breasts and-or ovaries.

The more radical decision you make, the more you reduce your risk of cancer, Ummel said.

“I couldn’t wait for the other foot to drop,” she said. “I found it empowering that I could be proactive.”

Her breasts have been removed and reconstructed.

Furrer, 52, said the complete hysterectomy was a no-brainer as she was soon expecting menopause and was done having children.

“So taking my ‘girly parts’ was a quick decision, especially knowing that ovarian cancer is so hard to detect,” Furrer said. “I chose not to do the mastectomy and to take the Tamoxifen to lower the breast-cancer risk. Then some big news broke about Tamoxifen causing a more aggressive cancer to happen. I then said ‘no’ to chemo prevention.”

She said she doesn’t like to mess around with her body unless it’s necessary, for fear something else might come up wrong.

“To go through that much surgery for preventative maintenance and then maybe die of another type of cancer or something else,” Furrer said, “Not worth it.”

Ummel said her mother was treated at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, where she was told about genetic testing.

“If others had this information and didn’t have to ‘stumble’ across it, they could be proactive if they so choose to be tested themselves,” she said. “One must have the knowledge it exists to be able to decide.”

Ummel’s children were also tested for the gene. Males can get breast cancer, too, she said.

Her son, 21, was negative.

Her daughter, 19, carries the mutated gene.

“She is calm about it,” her mother said. “She is young. She has time. It’s a personal choice.”

Furrer has two grown sons who have not been tested.

Ummel’s brother was distressed that she was letting a surgeon cut into her when she didn’t even have cancer. Her boyfriend of more than three years supported her decisions.

Saying she’s a worrier, she said a complete hysterectomy, double mastectomy and reconstruction were nothing compared to her mother’s ordeal with cancer.

“Some might think ignorance is bliss,” Ummel said. “My mom’s life and death allowed me to defy my destiny.”

Kristi O’Harran: 425-339-3451, oharran@heraldnet.com.

Correction, March 29, 2010: The caption on the photo with this article originally misidentified the test result that led Renee Ummel to choose radical surgery.