Cancer Updates

Amy Mickelson's public cancer battle has benefits, challenges

"Good Morning America" anchor Robin Roberts announced her breast cancer diagnosis on-air. Elizabeth Edwards hit the campaign trail with husband John Edwards after learning her cancer was back. And singer Melissa Etheridge performed bald and wrote a song about battling breast cancer.

As Amy Mickelson, the wife of popular pro golfer Phil Mickelson, goes public with her recent diagnosis of breast cancer, counselors and cancer patients say fighting cancer under the public glare can bring with it both benefits and challenges.

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New Yorkers have embraced 'Lefty' as a man of the people, even more so now as he prepares for the U.S. Open at Bethpage Black while his wife, Amy, battles breast cancer

They spent nearly seven hours together Tuesday, Phil Mickelson and his short-game coach, Dave Pelz.

In between all those practice chips and pitches at Bethpage Black, Pelz did his best to avoid the delicate topic -- the condition of Amy Mickelson, whose breast-cancer diagnosis prompted Phil to leave the PGA Tour for three weeks

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Cancer-stricken Dick Dale proves he's not over the hill

No amount of pain. No amount of worry. No amount of bad news could prevent the anointed "King of the Surf Guitar" from his music.

No, Dick Dale, the man behind "Miserlou" of Pulp Fiction fame, inevitably finds his safe place behind his Fender Stratocaster.

"My music soothes the beast," Dale said. "It makes one forget who they hate and who they are afraid of and for the moment, takes away all of one's problems, making them laugh, dance, sentimentally bringing happiness. It is like a good medicine. It opens the doors to one's soul so I can make them feel better."

It's an early afternoon interview as the 72-year-old left-handed guitar wizard relaxes at home in Southern California a few days before a West Coast Tour that brings him to Moe's Alley on June 21.

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More cancer patients seek out alternatives

TAMPA -- With much of her lower body consumed by cancer, Leslee Flasch finally faced the truth: The herbal supplements and special diet were not working.

"I want this thing cut out from me. I want it out," she told her family.

But it was too late. Her rectal cancer -- potentially curable earlier on -- had invaded bones, tissue, muscle, skin.

The 53-year-old Florida woman could barely sit, and constantly bled and soiled herself. She eventually died of the disease.
It was terrible," one doctor said. "The pain must have been excruciating."

Flasch had sought a natural cure. Instead, a deadly disease ran its natural course. And the herb peddlers who sold her hope in a bottle?

"Whatever money she had left in life, they got most of it," said a sister, Sharon Flasch. "They prey on the sick public with the belief that this stuff can help them, whether they can or can't."

Some people who try unproven remedies risk only money. But people with cancer can lose their only chance of beating the disease by skipping conventional treatment or by mixing in other therapies. Even harmless-sounding vitamins and "natural" supplements can interfere with cancer medicines or affect hormones that help cancer grow.


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