A brave eight-year-old girl from Centerville, Utah has been diagnosed with a rare form of breast cancer, becoming the youngest person ever to receive such a diagnosis, The Guardian reported.
Chrissy Turner found a lump in her chest last month but kept the discovery it to herself for some time before finding the courage to tell her parents.
"She came to us on a Sunday afternoon. She said, 'Mommy I have been scared and I have this lump,' " Chrissy's mom, Annette, told ABC News. "It had been there for a while."
The child's parents brought her to the doctor who diagnosed Chrissy with secretory carcinoma, a rare form of breast cancer that affects one in 1,000,000 people.
The news devastated Chrissy's parents, who have both been stricken by cancer themselves. Annnette was diagnosed with cervical cancer while her husband has been battling non-Hodgkins lymphoma for years.
"It was such a shock. No child should have to go through cancer," Annette told The Guardian, adding that Chrissy is "the youngest that they've run across having this particular type of breast cancer."
Secretory carcinoma accounts for only 0.15 percent of all breast cancers, and Chrissy's doctor expressed confidence the disease can be managed.
"It is very treatable," Dr. Brian Bucher, the young girl's physician at Primary Children's Hospital, told ABC News. "Chrissy will need to undergo a simple mastectomy ... to remove all the remaining breast tissue to prevent this cancer from coming back."
Chrissy is scheduled to undergo a mastectomy in December.
Her family set up a GoFundMe page to help raise funds for her medical expenses. They also created a Facebook page called Chrissy's Alliance where they post updates about her condition.
"I was scared to figure out what it was," Chrissy told ABC 4 Utah. "But I knew I could fight it off, and I hope that I can fight it off."
