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The cartoonist Paco Roca knows how to scrutinize human life like nobody else and draw it simple, true, without artifice. For something in 2020 he received the Eisner award, known as the Oscar of comics, and that is why he has joined forces with Roche to tell the story of Cristina, a 37-year-old woman who runs an architecture studio and leads a normal, reasonably happy life: she enjoys going to the movies, reading science fiction novels and swimming in the sea, especially in winter, when no one is on the beach and the water is freezing.
Until one day, after showering, she finds a lump in her breast, she goes to the gynecologist and, after studying it, they tell her that she has HER2 positive breast cancer. To do this, he receives a treatment that involves a therapeutic approach that he had never heard of: neoadjuvant treatment. What does it consist of? In administering one or more drugs before performing surgery. It is this phase prior to entering the operating room that provides, among other benefits, a reduction in the size of the tumor, which facilitates its subsequent removal.
Here Roca faces the challenge of explaining the experience of all those women who, after a complicated diagnosis, face an innovative treatment. “Without a doubt, the comic has great didactic power, using it to explain or reflect on topics that seem interesting to me always motivates me. It has been the case of Cristina’s Story, what counts how the patient faces cancer and how, thanks to the care of professionals, she overcomes it“, explains the cartoonist.
The main reference of the Spanish comic is about the story of a disease, as it did with Wrinkles, a story that jumped to the big screen in short film format and that He received the Goya award for best adapted screenplay in 2011. Roche intends, through Crisina’s testimony, to give visibility to all women who suffer from breast cancer – only in Spain about 33,000 new cases are diagnosed each year.
Within breast cancer there are different subtypes, of which approximately 20% are HER2 positive breast cancer, such as the one suffered by the protagonist of the comic. Until a few years ago, breast cancer was approached as a single disease, but medical research has revealed and to know that there are many subtypes and that each of them can be treated in a specific way.
According to Beatriz Lozano, director of Communication, Patients and CSR at Roche Farma España, “access to information and knowledge by patients of issues related to their health is a priority for us.” For this reason, she continues, “It is essential to innovate in informative formats together with artists of the stature of Paco Roca, who know how to bring scientific and health content to society, in a clear and entertaining way “.
This year, the Valencian cartoonist has seen his works turn into a moving image. Director Alejandro Amenábar will direct the film adaptation of another of The black swan treasure, while Daniel Monzón will convert The grooves of chance in a series.
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