I was a 38 year old mother of two little girls when, on September 21, 1988, I felt the lump.

My doctor performed a mastectomy instead of a lumpectomy without my consent and delivered a death sentence, assuring me I wouldn't be alive in 5 years. My marriage failed. I lost my job.

Despite these hardships, I was incredibly fortunate. I took charge of my health and found another doctor - a good one who encouraged me to participate in a drug trial that probably saved my life. I found a new job with healthcare that paid for my treatment. Twenty years later, I'm still here and going strong.

Unfortunately, not all women are so lucky. This year, 2,850 women in Colorado will be diagnosed with breast cancer and nearly 500 women will die from the disease. And the reality is that many women - racial and ethnic minorities, low income women and those with little or no health insurance - are less likely to receive quality care and are more likely to die from the disease.

Colorado's Women's Wellness Connection (WWC) program provides free breast and cervical cancer early detection services to low income uninsured and under-insured women in our state. Early detection is critical, as today 98 percent of patients survive at least 5 years when breast cancer is found and treatment begins before it spreads beyond the breast. That's why many say early detection is the closest thing we have to a cure.

Yet while nearly 8,000 women are being screened annually through WWC, more than 69,000 eligible women are not being reached due to lack of funds. This needs to change.

What's more, if a woman gets screened at a facility that is not part of the State's WWC program and is diagnosed with breast cancer, she will not be eligible to receive Medicaid coverage for life-saving treatment. Colorado is one of just six states that take advantage of a loophole in a federal law to deny Medicaid coverage to women who need it most. These women can either fight their breast cancer in poverty or die. And that is not acceptable.

This week I will join Lt. Governor Barbara O'Brien and leading breast cancer advocates at Susan G. Komen for the Cure's Komen Community Challenge to help narrow the gap in access to quality health care, research and information. Over the coming months, I will also be working with health officials and policymakers to close the existing loophole so that no woman in Colorado will be denied treatment simply because of where she got her mammogram.

For me, cancer is a word, not a death sentence. But we must make changes for everyone to be given a fighting chance like I had. One in seven women in Colorado will be diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime - they all deserve that chance.

State Representative Dianne Primavera is a 20 year breast cancer survivor. She Represents Colorado's 33rd House district, which includes Broomfield