By Jen Jones

For The Beacon

Emily Gephart never missed a mammogram . She said even during CO- VID , she made sure to get her mammogram . She is a nurse who has seen many patients deal with breast cancer and knows how important yearly scans are . Last November she missed her mammogram appointment , due to being ill with a respiratory infection that turned into pneumonia . Her appointment was delayed until Jan . 30 . That delay may have saved her life .

“ I had my mammogram on Jan . 30 , got a call back and a repeat mammogram on Feb . 2 , an ultrasound on the sixth , a biopsy on the eighth , and was diagnosed with triple negative invasive ductile carcinoma on the 15th ,”

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Gephart said .

This type of cancer was a surprise to her doctors , as it is very rare for her age group , her family has no history of cancer and it usually affects African American women .

Her doctors took no time in creating a plan of treatment for her . She met with her doctor on Feb . 21 , had her port placement on the 28th and began chemo on the 29th . The tumor was about two centimeters , with another satellite tumor a little over one centimeter . It is likely the tumors would have been too small to see had she had her mammogram in November .

“ It ’ s odd to say that pneumonia may have saved my life ,” Gephart said .

She had chemo treatments every two weeks for eight weeks , then had a repeat ultrasound .

“ The doctor said the tumor appeared to have a positive response to the chemo ,” she said .

She started on a weekly drug regimen , but by June she was too weak and her blood counts were dropping . She developed neuropathy , which is a possible side effect to one of the drugs .

The decision was made to pause the drugs for a week to let her body recuperate , but the fatigue and weakness were worse .

“ I barely made it into the doctor ’ s office for my appointment ,” Gephart said .

Her team decided

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to stop the chemo and schedule surgery . She had a lumpectomy on July 24 .

“ When the doctor said it was time to talk about surgery , I said , ‘ Good , I want a mastectomy .’ The doctor asked why I felt that way , and I said if there was a 30-37 % chance it would come back , I wanted the breast gone . But he told me if the cancer comes back , it likely won ’ t be in a breast . It will be somewhere else in my body .”

With that information Gephart agreed to the lumpectomy . After surgery the doctor told her it went very well and confidence was high all of the cancer had been removed .

“ They never say you are cancer-free . They say there is no evidence of cancer ,” Gephart said .

She also needed to deal with her auto-immune disease during treatment and made two trips a month to Columbus for intravenous immunoglobulin infusions to help bolster her immune system . She went for those from July 31 through Sept . 11 .

“ I think they did help ,” Gephart said .

Gephart began radiation treatments on Sept . 3 and completed those on Sept . 25 . She needed to

travel to Zanesville every day Monday through Friday for those .

“ I wish we still had an oncology department here in Coshocton ,” Gephart said .

She said she is very

Emily Gephart

tender and has radiation burns from her treatments . “ And I have to be careful after treatments to make sure there is something under my breast to keep the radiation from affecting my skin it comes in contact with ,” Gephart said .

She is feeling optimistic about her treatments .

“ I will continue to have doctor appointments and

“ Please — I can ’ t stress this enough — get your mammograms , no matter what . It ’ s better to find out you have cancer when it ’ s still treatable than when it ’ s too late . Go get your mammograms .”

Emily Gephart

scans every six months for the next two years to watch for a recurrence ,” Gephart said . “ Having cancer has definitely not been a bed of roses , but I ’ ve tried to maintain a positive attitude . ‘ Why

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me ?’ is useless . I just kept praying and reading scriptures .”

There were a few days she did get down .

“ I fell and broke my foot . For a few days , I was just so down . I couldn ’ t see a bright side . I finally asked myself why I was feeling like that ,” Gephart said . “ I ’ m on the other side of that now . But the pain in my foot and the radiation side effects of muscle and joint aches really pulled me down . It ’ s all in how you look at it . I have no history of cancer in my family . Asking ‘ why me ?’ could drive you crazy .”

Gephart said the main thing that got her through the last several months was her faith in God and her prayer warriors .

“ This was truly the only thing that got me through . I had people from the community , people from other churches , people around the world ( through her sister ’ s church ) that

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