Hannah Storm is opening up about her breast cancer diagnosis for the very first time.
After undergoing a routine mammogram in November 2023 followed by an ultrasound and biopsy, the ESPN reporter discovered through her doctors that she had the earliest form of breast cancer known as ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS).
“I was shocked,” Storm, 61, said on the Tuesday, March 19 episode of Good Morning America. “I had no risk factors. I have no breast cancer in my family. I did not have a lump. I did not have pain. I don’t have any genetic predisposition to breast cancer and what I came to learn is the vast majority of women who are diagnosed with breast cancer don’t have risk factors, and so, I gotta say, I was shocked, scared.”
According to the American Cancer Society, about one in five new breast cancers will be DCIS. Nearly all women with this early stage of breast cancer can be cured.
Because Storm’s cancer was still in the early stages, the SportsCenter coanchor was able to have a lumpectomy, a surgery that removes the cancer or other abnormal tissue from the breast.
After a successful surgery — which only required a week off from work — Storm was back on the field and grateful to learn she won’t need radiology.
“I was able to go back to work, cover the Super Bowl, which was a real blessing,” she told Robin Roberts. “I’m also taking a drug called tamoxifen that blocks all the estrogen and progesterone, which apparently, my cells feed off of that. I’m taking this for the next three years.”
Storm — who shares three daughters with husband Dan Hicks — said she kept her diagnosis private for a couple of months. But now, she wants to offer hope to women who find themselves in similar situations.
“I think about having daughters too and the importance of them understanding and advocating for their health and what you can do,” she shared. “This is how you find it. You find it through getting your yearly mammograms. This is how you find out that you have breast cancer and if you find out that you have it in the earliest form, it’s so treatable. There’s so much that you can do about it.”
Storm is also speaking out about her health in hopes that more women will take advantage of the resources available to them. Following her yearly tradition of mammogram appointments may have been a lifesaver for the journalist.
“You can find out and you need to find out,” Storm added. “Don’t be afraid to have a mammogram. Be afraid not to. Be afraid of what you don’t know.”
