When 32-year-old Janet Drouin went home from the hospital only 36 hours after undergoing a mastectomy of her right breast, she thought she could handle it. But an 18-inch draining tube, searing pain, and coping with the needs of her two kids, ages 1 and 2, turned out to be too much to handle.
Almost three years later, after persuading the Connecticut Legislature to pass a law mandating minimum 48-hour stays after mastectomies and to require insurance companies to pay for reconstructive surgery, Drouin is taking the fight to Capitol Hill and online. She tells her story on a new Web site created with the help of Representatives Anna Eshoo (D-California) and Rose DeLauro (D-Connecticut), who have introduced House bills similar to Connecticut's.
"I'm certainly not a Pamela Anderson wanna-be," Drouin said Wednesday on Capitol Hill. "This is not cosmetic surgery; this is about getting our lives back."
The Web site, launched Wednesday, encourages women to sign a petition urging committee hearings for the Eshoo and DeLauro bills and to tell their own stories about recovery from breast cancer. Yahoo plans to promote the site with free banner ads running from mid-September through October, Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
"It empowers patients to take control of their needs," said James Kean, president of the Sapient Health Network, which is hosting the site. The network provides online space for patients of asthma, breast cancer, depression, prostate cancer, diabetes, and other health problems. Kean said that the information provided by the petitioners, including name, email address and postal address, will be encrypted and won't be sold or distributed.
Although embarking on any sort of online petition drive is a venture into the unknown, Eshoo and DeLauro say breast cancer is such a powerful issue that people will want to participate. And, they say, the Internet is the perfect medium to rally support for their bills.
"This is about marrying the people and their stories with the technology to educate legislators," Eshoo said at a news conference in Washington on Wednesday. "Congress is not a pro-active institution. It is a reactive one, and hopefully it will react to this powerful testimony."
Eshoo's Reconstructive Breast Surgery Benefits Act would require health-insurance companies that provide coverage for mastectomies to also cover reconstructive breast surgery. The bill now has 114 co-sponsors. A companion bill in the Senate introduced by Senator Ted Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) has 16 co-sponsors.
DeLauro's Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act would require insurance companies to pay for 48 hours of inpatient care after such surgery, and at least 24 hours of hospitalization after lymph-node dissection undertaken during breast- cancer treatment. That bill has 186 co-sponsors and is matched by a companion bill by Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota.
US women have an estimated lifetime 1 in 8 chance of developing breast cancer, In 1995, about 182,000 American women were diagnosed with the disease, and 85,000 underwent mastectomies. Currently, 22 states require insurance companies to cover reconstructive surgery, but there is no federal law in place to do so.
"This is a small group of people," said DeLauro, who is herself a cancer survivor. "It is frustrating we can't get it before the legislative body or before the public through hearings."
