Inova Loudoun Plans Breast Cancer Retreat

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month, and to celebrate, Inova Breast Care Institute will, for the third consecutive year, host a retreat at Inova Loudoun Hospital.

According to Inova Loudoun’s Breast Nurse Navigator Barbara McDonnell, each year has brought a different theme to the event. In 2010 the theme focused on young women with breast cancer; in 2011, the focus was breast cancer and family genes.

It’s important to know what you need to do in order to take care of yourself following a diagnosis, McDonnell said, hence this year's theme.

“It’s a really intense experience that you go through when you’re diagnosed,” McDonnell said. As a survivor who was diagnosed with breast cancer back in 2008, McDonnell said patients can't let breast cancer define them.

Saturday's retreat, titled Breast Cancer Retreat ~ Survivorship: Thriving through Integrative Strategies, is an educational event, McDonnell said, which will feature breakout sessions on life beyond diagnosis, healthy eating after cancer treatment and maintaining mind/body wellness using integrative tools, among other things.

“You see all of these doctors and then you have to go through all of these different phases of treatment and then you’re done and it’s like, ‘Now what do I do?’" McDonnell said. "So this focuses more on how you move forward and take care of you so you don’t have an occurrence, so you don’t have to worry that it’s going to come back and how can you get yourself the healthiest that you can be.”

The first half of Saturday’s event will feature a number of experts who will share information on what patients can do in order to move on following the experience.

In the afternoon an open house will offer community resources, makeovers and massages, healthy cooking demonstrations, and free giveaways such as wigs, bras, scarves and hats, and soft pocket prostheses.

The event will take place from from 9:15 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Parkway, Conference Rooms A & B, Leesburg. Participation is free, but registration is requested. Visit www.inovalinktopink.org or call 1-855-694-6682.