Angelina Jolie has Ovaries removed due to Cancer Risk

Angelina Jolie has had her ovaries removed due to an imminent risk of cancer. This comes two years after she had her breasts removed due to the chances for cancer which seem to run in her family.

Angelina Jolie has had her mother, grandmother and aunt die of cancer one after the other. Since the disease probably has a genetic component that runs in her lineage, she consented to a double mastectomy about two years ago.

Now the risk factors were again rearing their head and so she decided to have her ovaries removed too. The first time around it was preventive and this time around too. But the consequences of the removal of her ovaries are much more serious than breast surgery.

Angelina Jolie has a genetic mutation that makes her liable to contract cancer. In order to prevent or rather avoid such a deadly diagnosis, she underwent a double mastectomy two years back, according to NYTimes. She was definitely at high risk for breast cancer but that is all in the past now. But the ovarian cancer risk was still at 50% which is a survive-or-die proposal.

She had been planning on the ovary and fallopian tubes removal since some time but when her personal physician called her and told her that there was some inflammation in one of her tests, she decided to go ahead with the daunting procedure. Ovary removal leads to menopausal symptoms that the body is literally forced into. And these can be pretty severe. 

Angelina Jolie wants other females to learn from her and get preventive surgeries if they are at high risk for cancers of various sorts. And although this might seem a bit too much on the safe side, it does make sense in a carcinogenic environment as our present-day, post-industrial society happens to be.

When Angelina came to know about the threat to her ovaries from the deadly disease, she immediately called her husband Brad who rushed on the first flight to be by her side in her hour of need.

Angelina has said that surgery is the last option when everything else has failed. She has explored Eastern and Western medicine alike and found a lot of traditional and alternative therapies that help alleviate some of the symptoms.

Although she doesn’t exactly have ovarian cancer since her reports for any tumors came out negative, Angelina went ahead with the operation about seven days ago. However, even she agrees that it is not possible to be 100% cancer-proof.

The chances still lurk somewhere underneath the body’s biochemical bases. Currently, she is taking hormone replacement supplements and also reaching out to connect with other women who face the same problem.

She wants others to learn from her condition and seek help before it is too late. Ignorance, says Jolie, is not the answer since cancer requires action.