Dr Kristi Funk
Breast cancer: facing up to a grim reality and how to fight back
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"When you look at all women diagnosed with breast cancer, literally only 5–10 per cent can point to an inherited genetic mutation as the major contributor to their cancer."
n a 'normal' day cancer surgeon Dr Kristi Funk is kitted out in medical scrubs and preparing to make an incision that she knows, for most women, should never be necessary. On any other day, she goes out of her way to explain why. Speaking at a recent Food Revolution Summit she said the medical fraternity had made good progress in the treatment of various cancers but, "there’s still a long way to go to stop people getting cancer in the first place." It’s a situation that deeply concerns her because research shows that 80 to 90 per cent of breast cancers alone “are under our control.” Acceptance of this fact was a hard thing for many women to handle, and when she speaks out about it, she often receives kickback on social media from cancer patients. “I get so brokenhearted when I get this backlash and I hear about it on social media or elsewhere,” she says. “Like, are you saying that I caused my cancer? How dare you. You're making this my fault? You're shaming me? I'm going through this terrible time and now you're telling me I did this to myself? “I have to say that it does break my heart because it's not my intention at all to shame in any way. I find it actually quite the opposite, like, incredibly empowering. Would you rather it be truly up to fate and genetics? So it's like, I guess I'll just sit around for the next however long I have until it comes back and kills me. “I think it's the most encouraging, exciting news to find out that every time you lift a fork to your mouth, every time you think or don't think, every time you exercise or don't exercise, every time you make choices in your life you can empower literally the cells inside your body with anticancer nutrients. With decreasing inflammation. Decreasing blood vessel growth called angiogenesis which all cancers require to survive inside of you. Decreasing growth factors and free radical formation. I think that's the best news a woman with breast cancer can possibly hear - you are not defenseless against this disease. “There is so much that I would love to show and teach you that you can be doing on a daily basis, plus or minus if you need it, the surgery, the radiation, the chemotherapy, the antiestrogen therapy. But you can be arming yourself with weapons, unleashing them on a daily, minute-to-minute basis.” Polls show that only 23 per cent of American women are aware there are any dietary steps that can be taken that would lower their chances of developing breast cancer. And among American
10 wholefoodliving.life | Spring 2022
Kristi Funk, MD, is a board-certified breast cancer surgeon and physician, a women's health advocate, and the best-selling author of Breasts: An Owner's Manual. She practices as a breast surgeon at the Pink Lotus Breast Center in Los Angeles. She has helped thousands of women through breast cancer treatment and recovery, including well-known celebrities like Angelina Jolie and Sheryl Crow. This article was compiled from an interview conducted by John Robins of the Food Revolution Summit. foodrevolutionsummit.org women with less than a high school education, only three per cent are aware that what they eat has any effect on their breast cancer risk.(8) Stats like this don’t surprise Dr Funk and she’s clear where the blame belongs, “unfortunately, the physician community doesn't receive any nutritional science in all of their undergrad, medical school, or residency years.
Pearls of wisdom “Then, when you emerge for the first time into your practice, you're so excited to finally do what you've been training so hard at for eons. You work hard all day; do you think you're going home to crack open some nutrition journal for pearls of wisdom you can pass on to your patients for free? Something you don't even think is there because, if they existed, someone should have told you along the way, right?” She says the outcome creates a “terrible misconception” that leads to more helplessness than need be for breast cancer patients when they talk to their medical oncologist – the doctor in charge of chemotherapy if required. “You see this doctor, especially for the first five years, every three months. Women repeatedly tell me, I asked so and so; ‘What else can I be doing?’ The answer is always — they mean it, though — is nothing. They're not hiding a secret or anything, they just genuinely are like, “Oh, honey. You did everything you were supposed to do. You just live your life. Don't worry about this cancer. We'll monitor you. You just go on living.” Another misconception Dr Funk likes to knock on the head is the
