Twisting Fate: My Journey with BRCA—from Breast Cancer Doctor to Patient, and Back

Munster, a San Francisco oncologist and researcher specializing in advanced cancer and BRCA gene mutations, lays out her own struggle with breast cancer in this intense and informative memoir. At age 48, Munster, a married mother of three, sensed something was not right with her body and decided to have a mammogram. Her hunch was spot on; the mammogram revealed several early-stage tumors. Because of the tumors’ multiple locations, Munster underwent a double mastectomy. Three months later, prompted by suspicious-looking pathology slides, she pursued genetic testing and discovered that she carried the BRCA2 gene mutation, which increased her chances for ovarian cancer (at first “I refused to fathom that my type of... cancer looked just like the in situ ovarian cancer found in BRCA mutation carriers”). Along with her own story, Munster shares the challenges of her patients, among them a young woman with breast cancer whose father asked how she’d find someone to love her after a double mastectomy. Having studied cancer for 20 years, Munster still marvels at the progress of medicine in her field, such as women who test positive for the BRCA mutation being able to avoid ovarian cancer by having their ovaries removed. Told from the unique perspective of a compassionate physician being treated for the very disease she has spent her life treating, this medical narrative is utterly engrossing. [em](Sept.) [/em]