Lead Filipino and the Stanford Cancer Institute presented the first ever Filipino cancer survey conducted in Santa Clara County at the Clara Family Health Plan Blanca Alvarado Community Resource Center last May 31.
The event is historic considering that 1.6 million Filipinos call California home. One in every 15 Californian is Filipino. Despite this, the team of Lead Filipino, headed by founder Dr. Angelica Cortez, reported that only 16 papers were found relating to Filipino cancer patients.
Director of Oncology Quality for the Stanford University Healthcare Alliance Dr. Elwyn Cabebe said that Lead Filipino got the grant for the survey in December 2020.
Stanford Cancer Institute Program Director Dr. Rachel Mesia said the survey was based on studies in California, Los Angeles specifically, Las Vegas, Hawaii, South Michigan and Philadelphia.
She revealed that, based on their findings, the top five prevalent chronic health conditions for Filipinos are: hypertension, high blood cholesterol, arthritis, diabetes and cancer.
Comparing Hawaii and California, she said third gen Filipinas are more prone to breast cancer than the first gen. And the risk for breast cancer is higher in Hawaii than in California. Dr. Cabebe also said this trend was observed among Japanese women in Hawaii.
This pattern was also observed for prostate cancer when Hawaii recorded higher risk than California.
The team urged a more robust public awareness program to dispel the Filipino community’s general fatalistic outlook and distrust of science and technology in order to get the message of preventive measures out. (Harvey I. Barkin)
