Silver Cross Nurse’s Breast Cancer Diagnosis Reinforces Power of Early Detection

Alicia Schidzikowski is proof positive that you can’t be too careful when it comes to catching breast cancer early. All of her maternal aunts have had breast cancer, including one when she was 36, according to Schidzikowski, a registered nurse in Interventional Radiology at Silver Cross Hospital in New Lenox. “I decided at 31, I was going to get genetic testing, which is just a blood test. The test showed no markers, but with the family history and my dense breast tissue, we wanted to keep an eye on it,” said Schidzikowski.So, every six months for the past two years, Schidzikowski had either an MRI or a mammogram. All was good until April this year. “The MRI showed something in my left breast, but we thought it might have been just a benign nodule. They did an ultrasound and said there were definitely two different small spots in my left breast.” Even then, Schidzikowski, who had two biopsies previously, wasn’t too worried. “I even thought about delaying a follow-up visit with my docto