Dr. Shria Kumar, Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Miami’s Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses why early detection is vital in reducing stomach cancer risk. She explains how cultural beliefs and stigma can delay care, the role of H. pylori infection and family history, and the importance of testing for household contacts.
[ACT]IVATED Tip
"...while there can be a stigma around having a bacterium that is transmitted, it's really imperative that you just ask the question. Tell your doctor if you have a family member with gastric cancer or H. pylori. You can get tested, you can get treated, and you can reduce your own risk of developing GI symptoms, or even stomach cancer."
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Transcript
Lisa Hatfield:
Dr. Kumar, your work shows how important early detection is for stomach cancer. But sometimes cultural beliefs can delay seeking care, like thinking stomach pain is just nerves or stress. How can patients push past these personal and cultural barriers to get the screening and the help that they need?
Dr. Shria Kumar:
Absolutely. I think GI illnesses and symptoms are generally uncomfortable to speak about and to talk about. Oftentimes, they are mislabeled as nerves or stress. But persistent symptoms shouldn’t be ignored, and being cautious can be essential when we are thinking about prevention or early detection.
I do think we’re doing a better job overall as a community of speaking about health in trusted spaces. And I think in medicine, we are recognizing that culturally sensitive care is imperative. That means using patient navigators, patient advocates, and appropriate language translation services, and ensuring that patients are educated as well as encouraged to share their knowledge or their health problems. The overall process does take time, but it’s the little steps that we’re doing now that are helpful.
Lisa Hatfield:
Then one follow-up I have to that is, say you have a patient diagnosed with stomach cancer. Is stomach cancer hereditary? Is there a hereditary component?
Dr. Shria Kumar:
Absolutely, these are both great questions. There are certain types of stomach cancer that are hereditary, and in general, we do know that one of the biggest risk factors for developing gastric cancer is having a family history of gastric cancer.
The other thing that we know is that if a family member has H. pylori-associated gastric cancer, or a household contact has that, other people in the household or in the family are also more likely to have H. pylori. We also know that treating and testing them, and if positive, treating them can reduce their own risk.
So I certainly encourage, if patients have a household contact with H. pylori or with gastric cancer, to speak with their own doctor and say, “My X, Y, or Z was diagnosed with stomach cancer. They were told it’s related to H. Pylori, should I be tested?”
Lisa Hatfield:
And one final question with this segment: when you mentioned household contact, is there something that they can do within that household to mitigate that risk of getting H. pylori?
Dr. Shria Kumar:
You know, there’s not necessarily anything you can do to mitigate that risk, but one of the really promising things is that if everyone in the household is tested and is negative for H. pylori, the risk of getting reinfected with H. pylori is exceedingly low in adulthood. So, one of the main things that we could do is just test multiple household contacts.
My [ACT]IVATION tip for this question is that while there can be a stigma around having a bacterium that is transmitted, it’s really imperative that you just ask the question. Tell your doctor if you have a family member with gastric cancer or H. pylori. You can get tested, you can get treated, and you can reduce your own risk of developing GI symptoms, or even stomach cancer.