Carla Jimenez feels lucky every day: she's alive. She's playing with Bruno and she beat stage three ovarian cancer.
Now, a new study could help prevent women from getting ovarian cancer in the first place. It all has to do with this over-the-counter low-dose aspirin.
Professor of Medicine, Shelley Tworoger found women who took low dose aspirin every day had a 23 percent lower risk of ovarian cancer compared to non-aspirin users.
"But taking regular dose aspirin, 325 milligrams, was not associated with lower risk of ovarian cancer."
Her study also found that women who took ten tablets per week for many years of non steroid anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen or naproxen had higher risk of developing ovarian cancer. Dr. Tworoger says more research needs to be done to make an official recommendation but since many women take aspirin to prevent heart disease they could be ahead of the game.
"If we can sort of loop people in by talking about cardiovascular disease we might have a secondary benefit of helping prevent ovarian cancer along the way."
And for survivors like Carla, she's just glad to hear aspirin is now an ally.
"To have anything that could actually be preventative is really kind of revolutionary."