The Young Survival Coalition's Diversity Program aims to foster a committed, connected and diverse community for young women affected by breast cancer. The Diversity Committee brings together women of color, women who partner with women, women of various socioeconomic backgrounds, cultures and disabilities.

As a collective, this committee works to create programs and to establish partnerships to work towards ensuring that all young women affected by breast cancer, in all communities, have access to the information and support they need.

Specific topics include:

• Diversity
• Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender
• Asian
• Black/African Descent
• Latina

Despite the news that cancer is set to explode in Asia, it's appearing as if adopting an Asian-inspired lifestyle may be the key to warding off cancer. Apparently, Asian and western women share the same genes that have recently been linked to an increased chance of developing breast cancer, and yet women in the west are more likely to develop cancer.

Asian lifestyles have long been touted as a way to stay healthy. The typical Asian diet is low in fat, meat and overall calories, and high in vegetables and soy, which is a stark change from the mainly animal-based North American diet, one that revolved around processed foods.

All that said, I don't think I could live on a fully Asian-style diet. I mean, I love sushi and Thai and many other Asian foods, but giving up my cheese? Say it ain't so.

What do you think?

Getting enough grains in your diet is very essential in the prevention of colon cancer. Switching from a white bread to a multi grain bread is an easy step. Adding ground up flax seed to the daily diet is another. And to me Risotto is to rice what wheat is to pasta. It is comfort food, satisfying, and can be fixed a hundred ways with or without meat, by adding various vegetables or just mixed with cheese, but the creamy texture is like no other. Here is one of my favorite personal risotto recipes that adds an unlikely candidate in the food world to the famous Italian food. Nappa cabbage, a cruciferous vegetable that aids in reducing carcinogens in the body and gives you lots of vitamins and nutrients. This is my Italian meets Asian recipe that makes this comfort food especially healthy in the fight against cancer.

Chef Vicki's Creamy Nappa Risotto

1/2 white onion chopped (medium onion in size)
1 celery stalk finely chopped
1 tablespoon minced garlic
2 tablespoons butter (you can substitute olive oil)
5 nappa cabbage leaves chopped.
5 cups vegetable broth
1 cup arborio rice

Note: If you don't buy boxed or canned vegetable broth you can use 5 vegetable bouillon cubes with 5 cups of water to make the broth.

Remember this is a slow cooking recipe that requires a lot of stirring and love watching over the pot. It takes approximately 30 minutes to cook this dish but it is well worth the wait.
Melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a medium sized sauce pan over medium heat and add onions, celery, and garlic. Saute for 1 to 2 minutes. Add arborio rice and stir until it is all coated and the starch from the rice starts to release. Slowly start adding your vegetable broth one cup at a time and wait for it to be absorbed before adding the next. Continue stirring until you add the last cup of broth. Add the Nappa cabbage with the last cup of broth and continue stirring until the liquid is absorbed and the rice is creamy.

The lung cancer drug Gefitinib has been taken off shelves in the United States due to ineffectiveness. But it remains effective in some Taiwanese lung cancer patients, according to a study published in the journal Lung Cancer.

The study, conducted by the National Health Research Institutes, involved 65 non-small-cell lung cancer patients and found that more than 50 percent of participants responded to the drug therapy -- while only 10 percent respond in Western studies.

A genetic mutation of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) was found in most patients who responded to Gefitinib. The mutation is rare in Western countries but much more common in East Asian countries where the mutation increases the likelihood of developing adenocarcinoma.

About 6,800 Taiwanese patients develop non-small-cell lung cancer every year. Of these, 65 percent of cases are adenocarcinoma. Of this group, 57 percent will have the genetic mutation. And roughly half will respond to Gefitinib.

About 1 in 7 Asian immigrants coming into the United States have hepatitis B and are at a much higher risk for liver cancer. The findings were published in a recent issue of Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, a publication of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Vaccinations can prevent hepatitis B infection and are given to children born in the US. Hepatitis B is the number one cause for liver cancer worldwide except for in the United States where the vaccinations are given at birth. Liver cancer in Asian males is number 2 just behind lung cancer.

Hepatitis B can be transmitted through blood or sexual contact and can be passed to children through their pregnant mother during birth. Children may also pick up hepatitis B from constant close contact with infected family members. Because signs and symptoms do not usually appear until the cancer is in its later stages, liver cancer is seldom diagnosed early. That is why project director, Henry Pollack, MD, and principal investigator of the hepatitis B and hepatocellular carcinoma project at NYU's Center for the Study of Asian American Health launched a program to inform Asian immigrants and their families to educate them about hepatitis B and help them get tested. If they are positive then they will get them into treatment.

The Asian paradox is a reference to the fact that although more people smoke more cigarettes in Asia, they are diagnosed with cancer in far fewer numbers than would be expected.

Researchers keep going back to green tea as the possible preventative to cancer, as the incidence of cancers is much lower in Asia compared to other countries. Yale School of Medicine researchers reviewed 100 experimental and clinical studies and found that drinking green tea might indeed be the reason in the lower incidence of cancer.

According to the researchers, the average 2.5 pints of green tea consumed daily by many people in Asia offers the antioxidant protective effects of the polyphenolic EGCG, which has been shown to play a key role in the prevention of tumor growth.

I think too, there is a synergy to the diet as a whole that researchers might not have discovered that plays a role in offering cancer prevention. In my personal opinion, I don't think it will be one food or liquid that will be the reason. The Asian diet pyramid is second in health only to the Mediterranean diet pyramid.

I love oysters any way and every way, and if I could every day. But as a cancer survivor and also a lupus patient I have to listen to the warnings my mother and the medical professional give me. Especially my mother.

Cancer patients including lymphoma, leukemia, and Hodgkin's disease are at risk for getting seriously ill or even dying when eating raw or under-cooked oysters. Vibrio vulnificus bacteria is without a doubt something that affects at risk people including cancer patients, people with liver disease including alcoholism, stomach disorders, and people with low immune systems. The illness is characterized by fever, chills, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, a sharp drop in blood pressure, intractable shock and possibly death. The majority of patients also develop painful skin lesions. The skin appears red then blisters develop quickly and erode into necrotic ulcers.

So do I have to cut out eating my favorite morsel from the sea? You can avoid Vibrio vulnificus bacteria by either not eating oysters or by eating them fully-cooked. Oysters are a good source for calcium, phosphorus, potassium, and vitamin A -- one of the antioxidants believed to help prevent cancer and protect against bacterial infections. Because of their copper and manganese content, oysters are credited with the prevention and treatment of anemia.

I choose to go the fully-cooked method. Here is one of my favorite recipes:

Spicy Asian Cooked Oysters

1 quart fresh shucked oysters, any size
2 T. butter
1 T. minced garlic
1/2 chopped onion
1 T. Worsheshire Sauce
1 T. Thai Chile Sauce
1 T. Oyster Sauce
juice of 1/2 fresh lemon
2 stalks thinly sliced celery
1 C. sliced red & green peppers
1 T. sesame oil
1 T. soy sauce
1 tsp finely chopped lemon grass
3 chopped green onions
1 T. chopped fresh cilantro
black pepper to taste

In a large saucepan, boil one quart of salted water. Add oysters, stir gently for 2-3 minutes. Remove oysters from pan, wash and rinse, set aside. In a large sauté pan, heat sesame oil and butter, add garlic, onion and lemon grass and sauté approximately one minute. Add oysters and simmer 2-3 minutes. Add remaining ingredients. Simmer, stirring gently until heated through. Add cilantro and green onions and stir well. Serve over steamed rice. Sprinkle with sesame seeds if desired.

Bon Appetit!

Because cancer can take years to develop -- and because certain dietary habits have been linked to an increased risk of cancer -- and because helping children adopt informed healthy habits of eating during the early years seems a practical strategy to a lifetime of cancer prevention -- this headline Parents health food fads make children ill, grabbed my attention. According to eating disorder expert Dr. Steve Bratman, parents who encourage their children to choose healthy foods are dangerous role models. It seems that limiting the amount of sugar, fat, salt and artificial additives are putting children at risk of serious damage to their health, and in some cases, death by starvation. With great pain, Dr. Bratman shares that he is deeply disturbed to be receiving an ever-increasing amount of email from children interested in healthy eating habits.

Because no term exists in medical tomes to describe this condition, Dr. Bratman made one up. He calls the condition of junk food aversion and deprivation -- orthorexia. Dr. Bratman has written a book and developed a website devoted to this new life-threatening eating disorder where growing numbers of children, influenced by their parents, are taking an interest in eating healthy. To use the closing remark often used by John Stossel of ABC News 20/20 to a news story that defies sanity and common sense -- give me a break!

The UK Bristol Cancer Help Centre conducted a survey and discovered that cancer patients are not given information about cancer prevention when it comes to diet. This does not surprise me. When I was newly-diagnosed with cancer and undergoing surgery and chemotherapy, no one discussed nutrition with me or how I might include cancer prevention foods in my menu planning. I had to research and educate myself about the benefits of eating healthy foods that would support my healing and long-term health.

In the survey of 1,288 cancer patients, the researchers found that 83 percent were not routinely given advice on nutrition by their healthcare team and 77 percent did not feel they could ask for it. In addition, 93 percent of the survey participants were not told where to find information about diet, even though 61 percent said they directly asked for information on the role of healthy eating.

Some of the cancer patients reported that when they did ask for advice on nutrition from healthcare workers, the answers they were given ranged from, "diet makes no difference, just eat normally" to "eat a healthy diet." Those answers are little help if there is no information provided defining what eat normally and healthy means. There is a mountain of research indicating that what we eat makes a difference to healing and health. This survey was not an eye-opener for me, but perhaps it will create an awareness in the healthcare community to the need for developing comprehensive educational materials on nutrition and diet for cancer patients and cancer survivors.  

The Asian American Network for Cancer Awareness, Research and Training and the American Cancer Society have launched the Asian and Pacific Islander Cancer Education Material, APICEM, web portal, as a searchable online database of Asian language cancer materials. The Asian and Pacific Islander Cancer Education Materials Web destination is designed to help Asians and Pacific Islanders with limited English-speaking abilities gain access to information on how to reduce their risks from preventable malignancies, including cancers of the breast, cervix, colon, liver, lung and stomach. APICEM provides links to participating websites that have Asian or Pacific Islander education materials. The materials referenced have been screened by the participating websites for medical accuracy and cultural relevance.