Oct. 1--EL PASO -- Elsa Cristina Morales was in her kitchen making a meal for her family last year when she felt it.
On the upper right side of her right breast, she felt a lump about the size of a lime.
She was only 33 and thought there was no way it could be what she feared -- cancer.
"It came out from one day to another and I was so worried," she said, her voice trembling as she remembered the day. "I was up all night crying. I was so worried, and worried more because I didn't have insurance."
Her gynecologist saw her the next day and referred her to a surgeon who biopsied the mass.
On March 11, 2008, she was diagnosed with cancer.
"I asked him 'When am I going to die, doctor?' and he said, 'It's not like that. You're going to survive. You need to take care of yourself.' "
Because she had no insurance, he referred her for treatment to the University Breast Care Center at the El Paso campus of the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center.
She began receiving treatment at the center a week later.
"I was crying. I was very happy because I knew I was going to have somebody to take care of me and I knew I was going to be OK," Morales said.
Surgeons removed her right breast and she had 12 chemotherapy treatments and 34 radiation treatments over about eight months.
Morales, now 34, is cancer-free and pursuing a degree in nursing. She showed her gratitude to University Breast Care Center on Wed nesday by modeling alongside her 7-year-old daughter Nicolle
Rodriguez in its annual fall luncheon and fashion show fundraiser.
"It was like a dream for me," Morales said. "It was something that I never imagined I was going to do and something ... to make me feel that I was going to be showing all the women that we're here. We can survive.
"There's a lot of help financially, emotionally, and that makes us strong."
Morales modeled alongside five other survivors and six "healing hunks," Texas Tech doctors who also strutted down the runway.
Wednesday's event at the Judson F. Williams Convention Center drew several hundred people and raised about $190,000 for the University Breast Care Center, which offers screening, diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer for medically indigent women
The need for such services is crucial in El Paso because about one in five Hispanic women develop the disease in their lifetime, said Dr. Raj-kumar Lakshmanaswamy, basic science researcher and director of the Center of Excellence in Cancer Research at Texas Tech's Paul L. Foster School of Medicine.
He is conducting research to attempt to prevent, predict or earlier diagnose the disease.
He said work to identify biomarkers in Hispanic women to fight the disease is a current research focus.
"We're trying to see if we can use some markers to detect it earlier, if we can find the molecular mechanism underlying this, because one day we may be able to reduce the risk of breast cancer," Lakshmanaswamy said. "My personal (hope) is to totally eradicate this disease and get rid of it."
Erica Molina Johnson may be reached at emolina@elpasotimes.com; 546-6132.
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