Statistics show that 1 in 8 women is affected by breast cancer. Zafire Panxhi, a nurse near the health center of Shlecan village in Elbasan, told about her battle with breast cancer.
If Zafire had done the annual check-up at the mammography ward, she could have escaped the horror of the chemotherapy that removed her breast and made her hair fall. Zafirja has decided to tell her story, to tell Albanian women how important the mammography check is.
“In 2018 I had chest pains, I went and did an echo there and was told that I was affected by breast cancer. I did a mammogram for safety and they told me the same thing there,” she says.
“I had neglected checks. When I went to the echo and mammogram. I was introduced as a nurse and there was nothing worse than directly communicating you that you have cancer. Terrible.
“As soon as I left the echo, I told my two sons and my husband on the phone that I had cancer. They did not believe it, they did not react. But I admitted I have cancer and went on to beat this disease. Then I went to the oncologist in Tirana, where they operated on me and removed my breast. I did chemotherapy, hormone therapy and I did it, here I am now. I tell all women to have an echo or mammogram because there you can find out if you have it or not, you may be in time to save yourself. ”
Covid 19, seems to have scared women to go to hospitals to do a mammogram, and even though the environment is disinfected every day and the mammography ward during the months of October worked for long hours, again the number of women being examined is very low.
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