Saturday's 5K Benefits Lung Cancer Research

Donna Boggs’ mother had a backache. Tiffany Hudak’s mom knew her problem was a sinus infection.  Julie Miller’s mother never smoked.

But medical exams revealed that all three women had lung cancer, one so advanced that she lived only three weeks after diagnosis.

The three women are friends and nurses. This weekend, they have organized the second annual Free to Breathe Athens 5K Run at Sandy Creek Park . Money raised through the event will benefit the National Lung Cancer Partnership, which awards grants to young medical and scientific researchers studying the disease.  

“There’s nothing pink about lung cancer,” says Hudak, who works at St. Mary’s and at the Moore Center for Plastic Surgery. “The stats are not positive or uplifting. It’s frustrating and frightening.”

After they each lost family members, the three started researching lung cancer, and their findings startled them. Because lung cancer kills more people in Georgia than do breast, colon or prostate cancer combined.

And yet, the research funding given by the National Cancer Institute is a pittance, what the friends call “deplorable.” They are happy about the wonderful discoveries made about breast cancer, but are disappointed that only $1,600 is spent per lung cancer death, while $14,000 is spent per breast cancer death.

“I’ve sensed this huge punitive feeling for people with lung cancer, from friends and from medical professionals as well,” says Hudak. “No one asks patients who didn’t take care of themselves and who are overweight, with coronary problems, why are you fat? With lung cancer, it’s perfectly normal to say, ‘Did you smoke?’”

Donna Boggs’ son-in-law didn’t. He was a strapping, 24-year-old Marine who was diagnosed with pneumonia that turned out to be lung cancer. He lived five and a half weeks, leaving Bogg’s daughter and grandchild without a husband and a father.

“Unless you go deeper in an exam, it’s often not diagnosed,” she says.

Saturday’s race begins at 8 a.m., with early registration in person at 7 a.m.There's a one-mile walk and a 5K walk and run. Kaye Oxner, who has lung cancer herself, is speaking, and so is Athens pulmonologist Wayne Middendorf. For more information about the event, click here.