Ovarian Cancer Survivors Raise Awareness

September is National Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month. To make sure Mississippians are aware of the symptoms, local survivors and activists are turning Coast towns teal for the very first time.
News 25’s Gina Tomlinson caught up with the Pass Christian woman who started it all and shares the details.
Decked out from head to toe in teal, the color for Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month, Pass Christian resident Lisa Hubbard hopes others will see and hear her message loud and clear: know the symptoms.
A cancer survivor herself, Hubbard has turned her pain into her mission. “After I was diagnosed, misdiagnosed, misdiagnosed. I don’t want anyone else to have to go through that.”
A Gulfport painting business is helping her paint the town teal. Workers at Neco’s Market are joining her on the front lines to help raise awareness about ovarian cancer. Knowing the signs and getting checked early can be lifesaving, something Pass Christian resident and cancer survivor Pam Ladner knows all too well. “I had a mass that was the size of a soccer ball that was covering my right ovary and part of my uterus.”
Hubbard says the problem with this deadly disease is that ovarian cancer is misdiagnosed more often than not. After being misdiagnosed three times and being told she would die in weeks if she didn’t start treatment, Hubbard tells News 25 the general symptoms are vague. “It can be considered a bladder infection, a kidney problem. Most of the time, they’ll say it’s a gastric issue.”
Hubbard says she is the first activist to officially register to turn a town teal in Mississippi. She and others have stepped up to hang ribbons from Picayune to Biloxi. “The pap does not check for ovarian cancer. There’s no screening test for it,” said Hubbard.
Hubbard is clean for now and spending her days free of the cancer armed with teal blue signs and a lifesaving message she’s spreading across South Mississippi. “We have so many people that are diagnosed in late stages. We want to change that.”