Episode 339: 10-22-15
Khalilah Camacho Ali
The former wife of boxing great Muhammad Ali – Khalilah Camacho Ali – visits us to talk about her years with the champ and share some great stories about his career and their life together. Khalilah was Ali’s right hand during most of his career. She was his social media rep, handling PR, promotions and strategy behind the scenes. When Ali was stripped of his boxing license and his U.S. passport for his refusal to serve in the military during the Vietnam War, Khalilah used her college money to help keep the family afloat. And she also helped keep Ali’s spirit afloat.
Social Media in Business
John Peter Mahoney – @SocialMedia305 – brings in a special guest, Khalilah Camacho Ali, former wife of boxing champ Muhammad Ali.
Mahoney is an event marketing, consulting, digital media and public relations expert. He taught me the language of Twitter and the art behind Twitter and Facebook ads. Johnny is also a top LinkedIn marketer.
We discuss how Khalilah Camacho Ali is using social media to build her brand. She recently set up a Twitter account – @KhalilahCAli – and is using it to promote Team Humanity, which works with high schools to teach etiquette and manners.
Breast Cancer Breakthroughs
Our special guest is Joyce M. Slingerland, M.D., Ph.D., F.R.C.P.(C), a leading breast oncologist and scientist with the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at UHealth-the University of Miami Health System and Director of the Braman Family Breast Cancer Institute. She’s also a professor of medicine and Associate Director for Translational Research at UM.
We discuss her groundbreaking research on breast cancer treatment.
Episode 339: 10-22-15 (To download, right-click and select “Save Link As”.)
Transcription:
Jim Fried: We’re on. We’ve got more Fried on Business right here. Hey, South Florida and the world, how are you? And we’ve got a scheduling change. Yes, John Mahoney will be on talking about – you can laugh, it’s okay girls – John Mahoney, he gave up his time to somebody you may have heard of.
Khalilah Ali: Khalilah Ali.
Jim Fried: That’s right. This is Ms. Muhammad Ali. We’re going to talk about how she’s going to work with Johnny to build her social media but we may get her to spill a couple of those stories that she has about the famous world leaders and perhaps the most famous man of our time.
Khalilah Ali: And I got them, boy, I got stories up the kazoo.
Jim Fried: You keep your kazoo over there. We’ll be right back after this. AC, it’s yours. And we’re going to dedicate this one to Cory Wells of Three Dog Night passed yesterday. It’s a great song. We’re all going to enjoy it right now. AC, rock on!
[commercial break]
Jim Fried: We’re going the social media thing, John Mahoney brought in his favorite new client that just happened to be Muhammad Ali’s wife. Khalilah Ali is with us, we’ve got a jamming session in here. We’re going to talk a little bit social media, we’re going to talk a little bit whatever she wants to talk about.
Khalilah Ali: Taking care of business, baby.
Jim Fried: I love that lady. John, come on, let’s talk a little.
John Mahoney: Yes, sir. Right here. As always, my friend.
Jim Fried: We’ve talked, this is Twitter, social media, yes, I heard that, by the way. We got Rocky played in the back for you, girlfriend. Give me..I just fist bumped with an Ali. I did it again.
John Mahoney: James, I’m going to tell you, as long as we’ve been together I thought today was probably the best ever but we have to thank young Paula.
Jim Fried: All right, Paula, high five. Now, Johnny, I want to do a little bit, Khalilah has just gotten her Twitter account rolling. Is that what’s going on?
John Mahoney: Yes, she actually has two but is now transferred to her own personal name.
Khalilah Ali: Thanks to you. Thank you very much.
John Mahoney: My pleasure. We had a great time last week.
Jim Fried: We’re going to talk about how to start off on Twitter then. It’s not going to be an advanced thing, we’re going to do a beginner thing today.
John Mahoney: Yes, let’s do it.
Jim Fried: Okay. So Khalilah just gets on Twitter, she decides she’s going to talk. What does she do?
John Mahoney: First off, Khalilah, take out your phone and tell everyone what your Twitter handle is.
Khalilah Ali: My Twitter handle is @KhalilahCAli.
John Mahoney: First name in my opinion, you need to put in a profile. There is no information there about who you are.
Khalilah Ali: All right. Because you’re teaching me this as we speak.
Jim Fried: So we’re going to put it in there and we’re going to go ”hot babe”, is that what you’re going to put?
John Mahoney: Definitely, ”hot babe”, lots of excitement. Find me at 880 The Biz on Thursday at 6:00. Okay?
Jim Fried: You’re too much, Johnny. I guess I got to retweet this thing here that you’ve got.
John Mahoney: You got to realize as much as, a lot of people are always looking to put content out there. They’re always looking to tell everybody about what they’re doing.
Khalilah Ali: I got a team, it’s called Team Humanity and I go into the high schools because I wrote a book about teaching etiquette and manners to adults as well as other kids and the youth.
John Mahoney: What high schools do you work with?
Khalilah Ali: The high schools that I’ve been going to, all high schools and I just came from North New Jersey, North New York and Atlanta, Georgia and I’m going to go to Chicago.
Jim Fried: I was born in Beth Israel Hospital in New York.
Khalilah Ali: Is that right?
Jim Fried: I’m telling you, girlfriend.
Khalilah Ali: Berney County, we’re going to be going to the high schools there.
John Mahoney: That’s why he doesn’t like The Jets.
Jim Fried: But I will give a high five to The Mets because if there’s one thing I really can’t stand it’s a bleeding heart Cubs fan. But I do have a lot of friends in our Cubs fans and God bless them including my uncle.
Khalilah Ali: Wait a minute. I was born and raised in Chicago but I’ve been a Yankee fan all my life.
Jim Fried: I think the next year will be the Cubs year.
John Mahoney: One thing, listen. If you’re from Chicago then it’s just a great thing that we swept you guys really quickly.
Jim Fried: Stop all that, stop the smack up. She gets online, she signs up, she gets a Twitter account, now she has to do her profile and her profile has to be something that attracts attention. Who do you help her attract attention, John?
John Mahoney: There’s two very important things to take into the account with Khalilah’s account.
Khalilah Ali: I’m a ninth-degree blackbelt, watch your back.
John Mahoney: Obviously, it goes without saying.
Jim Fried: She’s not going to be able to hold her own with a man.
John Mahoney: We have two important things. You have a lot of history and you have a very powerful name. So that goes along way. However, above and beyond that, you actually have a separate goal outside of sports and outside of your history right now. What you’re looking to do is take where you’ve been, what you’ve learned and share it with the younger community. So we want to accomplish two things with your profile. First off, we want to let the people know that don’t recognize the name or maybe only they know only the last part of it. So technically, they’re not your audience. Yes, they are you fans but they’re not your audience because you know what? You’re looking to get out of that and you’re looking to provide value some place else. So what we want to do is very briefly mention the past history. But then we want to immediately move in within 200 characters, letters saying ”Listen, this here is what I’m doing, the book, the students, the children” and every once in a while you can change it, saying ”You know what? I’m in New York”, or ”I’m in Chicago”, or ”I’m in Nevada now”. Also, we need to figure out who are the people that you need to find that help your cause, that are going to help to support you. Is that book publishers or is that a high schools, is it teachers, is it counties.
Jim Fried: Probably Lauren and Lauren’s Kids and Lauren’s followers. Lauren Book is one of our sponsors and we’re very close with them, we have a lot of things that we do, we’ve got a big social that they do every year, probably getting involved with them. We’d be happy to put you all together with them.
John Mahoney: That right there is the synergy and the collaboration.
Jim Fried: Hold on then. Let me start doing that on Twitter right now. Johnny, retweet what I just did and signal it at Lauren’s Kids. So I’m going to do that now while you-
John Mahoney: We have pictures and videos. So trust me, she’s live as a wiring. Probably Lauren is listening to this station.
Khalilah Ali: I have some pictures from the kids that I went to, the school and stuff. I’m going to put them on my website. It’s going to be khalilahcamachoali.com and you’ll be able to go to website and see we’re just bringing it up and we have a lot of letters that the kids sent to me when I spoke to them in the high schools. And they were so excited, they said ”You know, when somebody came out, when you say you’re going to speak, somebody is going to come and speak, we thought it was going to be boring as hell, we’d go to sleep and until you came it changed our minds and we loved it”.
Jim Fried: What’s one thing that you tell the kids?
Khalilah Ali: I tell the kids ”Focus and be very interested in what’s going on in your high school years now because these are the most precious years of your life and this is the one you should focus on. Don’t think about boyfriends and girlfriends, think about what you want to be in life first”.
Jim Fried: They’re nodding even in the control room. AC, you like that? Is that the message?
AC: That is definitely the message.
Khalilah Ali: All right, brother. That boy got a beautiful voice. He made the chills all over my body.
Jim Fried: Yes, everybody says that to him every week. And fortunately, you’re raising my price here. The price is going up. AC, you got to give her another hit, can you hit her again?
AC: There you go, baby.
Jim Fried: We need CPR. There you go.
Khalilah Ali: When you make a bell, I have to get up again. I’m not turning around, I tell you that. My original godfather, his name was Berry White, for real. And he’s the real Berry White.
Jim Fried: Is it really the real Berry White?
Khalilah Ali: Would you tell him?
John Mahoney: You need to hear the James Brown story.
Jim Fried: You didn’t know I like to do that too.
Khalilah Ali: I am single and I’m ready to mingle, you better be careful, brother.
Jim Fried: I’m married but I don’t know about AC. AC, how are you doing?
Khalilah Ali: I’m not turning around. I’m good.
Jim Fried: He’s got the dreadlocks, he’s built like a brick-kind-of house if you know what I’m saying.
Khalilah Ali: TKO, that’s what it is.
Jim Fried: Listen Johnny, we’ve only got a minute left. It sounds to me like we’re already making some good viral content and that’s important, isn’t it?
John Mahoney: I thought we have 30 minutes left.
Jim Fried: No, in this segment.
Khalilah Ali: Hey, John, guess what? I want everybody to come out and meet in Miami. I’m going to be over there at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex on Saturday. I will be giving out autographs and everything, I want everybody to come out there, the Social Media, everybody to come out there. It’s going to be 212 Northeast 59th Terrace in Miami, Florida. I’m going to be there. If you come there between 12:00 and 2:00, before 12:00 it’s free. After 12:00 you pay $10. But come before, we’re going to have all the stuff for kids.
Jim Fried: So kids should show up 11:00, 12:00. Johnny, we got to hit that with Lauren and all other stuff.
Khalilah Ali: We’ve got games and entertainment for the kids, the whole family. The whole family should be there.
Jim Fried: I got to introduce her to Larry, the guys at Warren Henry also. We need them involved with her too.
Khalilah Ali: And they’re going to have just great-
John Mahoney: Is the event online? Is there a website or a Facebook event or an event?
Khalilah Ali: Yes, we sure do. We got talent4change.org.
John Mahoney: And for James’ Jet’s fans, could you say that one more time?
Khalilah Ali: www.talent4change.org.
Jim Fried: And .org is spelled .O-R-G, again for the Jets fans.
Khalilah Ali: You can also go to www.khalilahcamachoali.com but that’s a long one. Just go to talent4change.org, I’m part of the group. It’s a non-profit organization.
John Mahoney: I say we just get you kca.com, it’s simple.
Jim Fried: We’ll have to work on that. We’re having a great time.
Khalilah Ali: Hey, Jim, I got something for you.
Jim Fried: Give it to me.
Khalilah Ali: I wrote this when I was 13-years old. This is the legend of Cassius Clay, the most beautiful fighter in the world today. This kid fights great; he’s got speed and endurance, But if you try to sign to fight him, increase your insurance. This kid’s got a left; this kid’s got a right, look at the kid you care to fight; the crowd is getting frantic; there’s not enough room; the Ali low is a boom; Who they thought would they come to fight they’ll see Spook Satellite, no one would dream when they put down their money; this year a total eclipse of the sun. And that’s a Muhammad Ali, when I was 13.
John Mahoney: We should be videotaping this whole room.
Jim Fried: We’re going to videotape the next segment.
Khalilah Ali: Because I will be back.
Jim Fried: That’s right. We’re going to be back with more of Ms. Muhammad Ali, Khalilah Camacho Ali. We’ll be back after this. And you know what I am right now, don’t you?
[commercial break]
Jim Fried: We’re back, the thing is live, we’re rocking and rolling. I am a fireball. Now we are back, we are here with Khalilah Camacho Ali, you may know her as Ms. Muhammad Ali. She gave us her first poem that she wrote for Muhammad. She’s going to do some more poems in a minute. But before we get to that, we’re going to talk about a story. Give me your favorite story about your old man.
Khalilah Ali: Let me see. This is pretty serious. When he wasn’t making that money, we were driving to Fargo, North Dakota and we were going to speak at the college and what happened was, this is during the ’60s, so when he was stripped him of his license and his passport so we had to make money so I figured you go in the road and I write speeches for you. And it was incredible by him not going to the armed forces, and a lot of people called him draft dodger and stuff like that, it wasn’t cool. So he got up to make a speech and it was wonderful, people loved him and it was really nice and all of a sudden, a heckler heckled out and said ”You draft dodging n****”.
Jim Fried: He said the word we don’t mention on the radio, that starts with the letter after M.
Khalilah Ali: Yes. And he said the n-word and he goes ”Oh, hell, this is not going to work, I’m not going to do this, I’m not going to get up there”, I said ”Ali, we have to make money for our family, this is my campaign to be the people’s champion”. He said, ”I’m not doing it, I’m not going to get up there and make it in front of the … and this guy comes out, this heckler comes down and says this to me”. And I gave him a story. He said ”Really?”. So he couldn’t wait to get on stage and wait for the heckler to heckle out and sure enough he had a beautiful speech, the heckler heckled out ”You draft dodgin n***” and then he goes ”Ladies and gentlemen, that reminds me a long time ago when I was a little boy, I would throw rocks at this donkey and my grandmother said ”Cassius, don’t throw rocks at that donkey because that donkey is going to die and he’s going to come back and haunt you”, Ladies and gentlemen, I do believe that donkey is here tonight”.
Jim Fried: That’s great. I’m sorry but that was just awesome. You write these things for him?
Khalilah Ali: Yes. And he was so happy about it, they laughed so hard they had to..they stopped heckling and then Ali-
Jim Fried: Who could heckle a guy like that?
Khalilah Ali: They did. These were some serious people. It was so good he did it every time and every time they did and it stopped. And Ali was so upset about it so Ali, what he only did, he would plan this with somebody in audience just to tell the story.
John Mahoney: Rope-a-dope during public speaking.
Jim Fried: That’s beautiful. Let me ask you this. We all know the story, we know that the government prosecuted him, they took away the best years of his life, I actually met him in the late ’80s and shook his hand and such. It was a moment that I’ll never forget, it was still out there vigorously in the public eye at that point. So Muhammad comes back, he gets reinstated. What’s a good story about after he got his belt back? Tell me a little bit about after he gets back in there.
Khalilah Ali: My story is coming out possibly next year and 2016 is going to be a hot year because I was with him during the most impossible days of his life, keeping him pumped up, keeping him and waiting for that moment that somebody would give him his license back, so we went three years struggling and I use my college money to support each other until that day actually happened. And I was in Philadelphia at the time when Jessie Hill called him on the phone and said he had his license back. And that was the most..we had just out our twin girls, Rashida and Jamila and I was in Philadelphia and he had to go to Atlanta, Georgia to do his first fight with Jerry Quarry. It was a great day.
Jim Fried: That guy did sure bleed a lot.
Khalilah Ali: Yes, he did. He was a bleeder. But there’s one thing I can say about Jerry Quarry, when they came to. He was a bleeder. That’s what they do. If Ali hit me I’d be bleeding too.
Jim Fried: That’s what I meant. Now, how many books have you got?
Khalilah Ali: It’s like Michael Douglas said to me last week, he said ”You need to write about 100 books because this is going to be a saga, for real”, and I said ”Okay, Michael thank you very much”. But I figured I’ll just do some memoirs and tell them what I want them to know. It was a great time during that time because social media was just between me and Ali, I did all his social media. I was his PR person, his promotion person and that was kept quiet for many years. I did all his social media. That was the biggest of social media ever. And you didn’t have to pay a dime to do it.
Jim Fried: Muhammad has been reinstated, he’s the people’s champ, he’s come through the jungles and now he’s back on top. What was his perception now of the fans and the people out there? What did he think about the people?
Khalilah Ali: He was proved of himself to do the right thing and now they respect him for what he did and they give him a lot of respect now and he is happy that I kept him going, he said because I never would’ve thought it’d ever happen again. And he thank me for it and we have four beautiful children during that. And he was just a happy camper. He still is today and to look at him today is sad. With the Parkinson’s disease I divorced him. Years ago we had four beautiful children but I didn’t divorce the family part, we stay friends all through the time of our divorce.
Jim Fried: I must say that his physical deterioration has been something that’s unfortunate. I have to tell you that I hope someday you’ll come-
Khalilah Ali: Do you want to know what he told me last week? He called me on the phone. He could barely talk. He said ”Guess what?”. I said ”What?”, ”I’m going to make a comeback”.
Jim Fried: I love it.
Khalilah Ali: And I cracked up for a week.
Jim Fried: Now I want you to know that I have a photo of Muhammad, it’s in my office. The same photo is in my house. It’s the photo of him shadow boxing under water.
Khalilah Ali: That’s his favorite picture.
Jim Fried: Perpendicular or something. And the reason that I keep that picture and why it inspires me to this day is because he turned the tables and did something and he was something that nobody ever really realized he was. He was not a counter-culture figure but literally a cultural icon and the culture had to come to him. And he had to do things his way, sometimes it was different.
Khalilah Ali: But you know what? When I was around him, the moment of his success at going back into the ring again, he drew more people around him like Queen Elizabeth, The Beatles, everybody was around him, I admit, every international star, president or king there ever was and I was right there. To be singing the Beatles as kid, I loved the Beatles when I was a kid, ”I Want To Hold Your Hand” was my favorite song and to see Albert Hall, Albert Hall back in those days in England wanted to do exhibition there.
Jim Fried: It wasn’t a guy, it was a place.
Khalilah Ali: It was a place. And Ali and The Beatles were in Albert Hall and he was knocking them out and everything but it was really great because I met kings and queens being with this man and my story is going to be really humdinger because he’s notarized. I got on an airplane one time with Robert Goulet, I don’t know if you know this guy. He was on the plane and..Robert Goulet gets on the plane and Ali goes to the bathroom, he doesn’t see him. And Robert Goulet wants to sit next to me. I was a hot babe. And I said ”I’m sorry, you can’t sit there, my husband is sitting here” and he says ”Who is your husband? Muhammad Ali or somebody?”. Unbelievable.
Jim Fried: Hold on a minute. You were going somewhere before and I was talking about how hot you were and all that stuff and everything else and you were talking about how hit I am but I want you to know that I am successful.
Khalilah Ali: Why are you successful?
Jim Fried: I’m successful for the same reasons Ali was successful back then. Because I have the most powerful, wonderful, beautiful woman behind me, she’s my strength, she’s my vision, she’s the person who keeps me together and keeps me going strong when I feel low. That’s the way you’re all.
Khalilah Ali: That’s why Ali became the greatest of all time because I was back there supporting him.
Jim Fried: So that makes you the GOAT too then.
Khalilah Ali: I might not be the greatest but I am the latest.
Jim Fried: It’s too much fun going on here.
Khalilah Ali: I love you. Why? Because you’re fantastic.
Jim Fried: Thank you so much. Because of that, I’m going to ask you if you could stay one more segment with us. Can you do that, please?
Khalilah Ali: Hell yeah.
Jim Fried: We’ve got to roll, we got to pay some bills.
Khalilah Ali: I wouldn’t miss it for nothing in the world.
Jim Fried: We got our big sponsor on for about 15 minutes with UHealth and then we’re going to come back, we’re going to wrap up the show with more questions from the woman behind the man, Khalilah Camacho Ali, the woman who made Ali. We’ll be back after this. AC, take it away.
[commercial break]
Jim Fried: We’re back and we’re back with our UHealth expert today. We’ve got a big one, Dr Joyce M. Slingerland, M.D., Ph.D., she’s a specialist in hematology, oncology, she’s a breast cancer oncologist, she’s also the director of the Braman Family Breast Cancer Institute at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center. Doctor, welcome to the show.
Joyce M. Slingerland: Thank you.
Jim Fried: Thanks so much for being here, for being a part of our community. How long have you been here at UHealth, Doctor?
Joyce M. Slingerland: I’ve been at the university since 2002, I was recruited here from the University of Toronto in Canada where I did practice as a clinician scientist for a decade and I was recruited here to build a multidisciplinary research program in breast cancer.
Jim Fried: You’ve got fans. The minute I put your email I heard from Charles Bennett Sachs, old friend of mine, and he told me that your were friends and I bet you got more than just Charles out there.
Joyce M. Slingerland: I hope so.
Jim Fried: You moved down here, and you’re really a breast cancer researcher, right?
Joyce M. Slingerland: I’m actually a card-carrying breast cancer doctor so I’m a medical oncologist. That means I treat women who have breast cancers, who need either systemic treatment with chemotherapy or endocrine therapy. But also I’m trained as a basic science researcher so run a laboratory in which we investigate the underlying molecular causes behind the development and progression of breast cancer.
Jim Fried: These must be just very exciting times for you with all the new things that we’re seeing and all the new medicines and all the new approaches to breast cancer. Which ones are you involved with?
Joyce M. Slingerland: Actually quite a number. So, speaking to the research ongoing in my own laboratory, I’ve had an interest for many years in understanding how do anti-estrogen or endocrine therapies for breast cancer work and what are the causes that give rise to the development eventually of resistance to endocrine therapy when that happens.
Jim Fried: It sounds to me like there’s a lot of things that are involved that impact what you’re doing and there’s not just one special thing that you can focus on.
Joyce M. Slingerland: About 60 percent of breast cancer patients have tumors that express the estrogen receptor that for receptor for the female hormone estrogen. And the vast majority of those will be responsive to either medications that stop production of estrogen or medications that block the estrogen receptor. But in the fullness of time during course fo treatment, molecular pathways get activated that prevent the cancer from responding to that kind of treatment and we’ve discovered in my own laboratory a small molecule called P27 that actually plays a role as a brakes molecule. And it helps the cancer cells stop growing when estrogen is removed or when the estrogen receptors are blocked. But we also discovered that there’s a sneaky oncogene called Src that gets activated. And when Src is activated it sends a signal to degrade the brakes molecule. So if you got high Src, that’s like having the green light on continuously and you can imagine that the traffic would get a little bit confusing and if you have high Src, you can’t respond to endocrine therapy as well. So we actually discovered that pathway in the lab that got published in a major paper in Cell which is an important molecular biology journal. And this led us to consider how we might take this through from the lab to the clinic and ultimately we’ve been working through nationally funded grants to build a clinical trial in which we combine in an inhibitor of Src which is made by AstraZeneca together with an inhibitor of production of estrogen called an estracell and we’re now doing clinical trial where we put those two drugs together and are testing whether they work better together than does an estracell alone.
Jim Fried: This is an exciting time then because it seems to me that women who have breast cancer either currently, I guess this probably..is this available and working for ladies today?
Joyce M. Slingerland: Right now we’re at the point where we tested the two drugs together and found that they were safe and they didn’t cause too many side effects and they didn’t appear to interfere with the action of the drug that was tried and true. And we’re now doing a clinical trial for women nearly diagnosed breast cancers that are bigger than two centimeters. The women have to be after menopause because one of the medications works best after menopause and this trial is comparing an estracell alone which is an aromatase inhibitor that blocks production of estrogen and it’s a standard therapy. And we’re comparing that drug alone versus that drug with a Src inhibitor. And that trial is ongoing right now, we’ve had 40 patients enrolled in this study at Sylvester and at Jackson and we’re going this study in both places, the same doctors take care of the same patients, sorry, same doctors take care of patients in both locations here at UM and we’re optimistic that we’re going to be able to finish that trial within the next three to six months.
Jim Fried: Somebody wanted to be a part of that trial, is it something they can participate in?
Joyce M. Slingerland: Absolutely.
Jim Fried: How would they get information to join your trial, Doctor?
Joyce M. Slingerland: The personal contact would probably be Jenny Obando who handles our triage of new patients at UM, and let me just pull up her contact information, so Jennier O-B-A-N-D-O and her phone number is 305 243 6645.
Jim Fried: Okay, can you give it to us again while the people might have been getting their pencils ready and stuff?
Joyce M. Slingerland: Sure. Jenny Obando is the triage nurse at Sylvester. Her number is 305 243 6645 but I’m sure she’d be able to handle most of the calls and direct them to me as needed.
Jim Fried: That’s great. I had a couple of other questions that I wanted to ask because you talked about your identifying these drugs and therapies, the folks that have breast cancer get the therapies. Let’s say that the therapy is successful, they’ve come through breast cancer, I know that you’re involved with a whole variety of different ways to approach the treatment of breast cancer. Somebody is now going through the breast cancer situation, they’ve come through, they’ve got a pretty good solid clean bill of health but maybe their immunity system or the rest of their body isn’t the same as it was before the treatment started. What can you do for a woman who’s through the breast cancer treatment but may have some physical and psychological issues to overcome from that process?
Joyce M. Slingerland: I think one of the most important things for all women with breast cancer regardless their age, once they’ve gone through their potentially curative therapy, having had their breast cancer removed, gone through their chemotherapy or being on endocrine therapy is diet, an exercise – I hate to say it – but I think that keeping a normal body weight is probably as important as curative chemotherapy. It may have as powerful an impact on patient outcome. So one of the things that is becoming abundantly clear is that there’s an increasing risk of developing breast cancer or having a bad outcome from breast cancer with increasing body weight and obesity. And that’s particularly so for post-menopausal breast cancer or breast cancer after menopause. So very important, I do an exercise history and go over weight with all of my patients when I see them in the clinic it’s very important that women pay attention to taking care of themselves, looking to ways of weight reduction to try to get back to a normal body weight and incorporating exercise in their daily if not weekly routine.
Jim Fried: Dr. Slingerland, your’e coming up with some great tips for the people here. We’ve only got about a minute left, we’ve already given how to find your triage nurse. If you want to speak to the population out there that may be considering that maybe they have breast cancer, what would you advise them to do? What’s your message to take away for everybody today?
Joyce M. Slingerland: Stay fit, keep your weight down, have your mammogram screening between the ages of 45 up to 55 every year.
Jim Fried: Now that’s a change from even a couple of weeks ago, right? Didn’t that change?
Joyce M. Slingerland: Not really a change. I think the American College of Radiology in the society of breast cancer imaging hasn’t changed.
Jim Fried: Sorry, I watch too much TV.
Joyce M. Slingerland: The ACS, the American Cancer Society came out with new guidelines but those have not yet lead to a uniform change in policy so the American, what we had before was American College of Radiology and Society of Breast Imaging still endorse annual screening beginning at the age of 40. It’s important to remember that breast cancer between the ages of 40 and 50 accounts only for about 12% of all breast cancers developing but has a much higher death rate from breast cancer. So that rate is between 16%-18% of all deaths from breast cancer. The individuals who are diagnosed with breast cancer between the ages of 40 and 50 may have a more aggressive form of a disease and represent many more years fo life loss than later in life. The bottom line somewhere is between the ages of 45 and 55 annual screening strongly recommended, the ACS guidelines are suggesting that it may not be necessary to have annual screening after 55 and that every second year might be okay but we’re not still certain of that. For the individuals between the ages of 40 and 45 it’s important to think about the options for starting annual mammograms at that time. We certainly would regret to see insurance carriers making decisions for women because that’s a discussion that needs to take place between the women and the doctor and currently the major recommendation is annual screening.
Jim Fried: Doc, I want to thank you so much, Dr. Joyce Slingerland for coming on our show and educating our listeners about the breakthroughs that you’re doing every day at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center. Thank you so much for being on and good luck to you and the rest of the folks at Sylvester.
Joyce M. Slingerland: Thanks for having me.
Jim Fried: It’s my pleasure. We’ll be right back after this short break. I’m going to talk about why I’m the oldest Millennial. We’ll be back after this. AC, take it away.
[commercial break]
Jim Fried: We’re back and Khalilah Ali is swinging at me. She’s ready to rock and roll. We’re going to tell some great Muhammad Ali stories. Khalilah, welcome back to the show. Johnny, you got to get over here, bud. Johnny, get over there. We don’t care how it works as well, we want it to work good here. Khalilah, tell be a little bit about Muhammad. We did a story about the early days, we did a story about when he came back, we talked a little bit about how he called you today, let’s talk just for a second about his feelings towards the other folks that he was in the ring with, his contemporaries, his peers. What does he feel today about Foreman and the other guy, Frasier?
Khalilah Ali: Muhammad Ali was his own promoter, his was his own self-promoter. I mean, who does that? The Sunny Liston thing, I mean the guy would take a bear trap and put it in front of his house and say that he was going to get this ugly bear and he set the trap and everything. They couldn’t believe it. And the cops start coming around and said ”This guy got a bear trap for this guy. What do you do?” Who does that?. That brought a lot of attention to him in the fight with Sunny Liston. And when he would move forward, Floyd Patterson, he had a bushel of carrots in front of him because he called him The Rabbit. I mean, who does that? Half of the fight is already won just with him intimidating him every time.
Jim Fried: Isn’t that the way he’s always? That’s what Sun Tzu says. He says the fight is over before it get started half the time.
Khalilah Ali: In boxing they don’t usually that and I asked Muhammad a long time ago ”Why do you do stuff like that?” , he says ”Long time ago I used to go to wrestling match with the Gorgeous George” and this guy had blond hair, blue eyes, he would have a comb, he’d have two blonds at his shoulder and would say ”I’m the prettiest wrestler ever” and just come and they would hate him so much, he packed the whole arena. They wanted to see somebody that will actually hurt this pretty guy and Ali said ”If he can do it, I can do it”.
Jim Fried: That’s where the Gorgeous George, I never thought of that.
Khalilah Ali: He used to love wrestling and he used to love to see Gorgeous George.
Jim Fried: The pretty boy just like him.
Khalilah Ali: And he said ”People would fill the ring size up” and he would see all the..he said ”He would fill that ring more than any other wrestler because he said he was pretty”.
Jim Fried: Wait a minute. We’ve only got a couple of minutes left, I want you to do the poem even if I don’t do my close, I want the poem.
Khalilah Ali: You want the poem? You know what? Back in those days they would call the darker race Spooks. So it was like the Spook Satellite kind of thing that the wrestlers do. So I just figured Ali would only name ”The round it will go down” and he would ”I’d get Archie Moore and Foreman, I’ll send you to heaven the seventh” but that was the extent of his poetic justice. So I figured out I’ll write something for him, so he actually inspired me to write a poem and I used to mimic the way he would say it. I would mimic. This is the legend of Cassius Clay, the most beautiful fighter in the world today. This kid fights great; he’s got speed and endurance, But if you try to sign to fight him, increase your insurance. This kid’s got a left; this kid’s got a right, look at the kid you care fo fight; the crowd is getting frantic; there’s not enough room; the Ali low is a boom; Who they thought would they come to fight they’ll see a Spook Satellite, no one would dream when they put down their money; this year I totally a total eclipse of the sun.
Jim Fried: That’s great. I want to thank Khalilah Ali, Johnny thanks for bringing her in. If you missed today’s show, it’s going to be up on our webpage www.friedonbusiness.com. How much time do I got left? One minute. Okay, I got to go through my speed round. Let me only thank everybody. I want to thank KIND Snacks, South Florida Business and Wealth Magazine, the CCIMs, UHealth, Warren Henry Automotive, The NFL Alumni, Social Media 305, The Aztec Group, The Bergstorm Center for Real Estate Studies, and of course, thank you to our listeners. Go to our Facebook page, like our show, tell us who you want to see, Twitter @JimFried, @FriedOnBusiness. If you missed today’s show, it’ll be up on our webpage www.friedonbusiness.com. This is Jim Fried for Fried on Business. Look for us next week on 880 AM. Why? Because I think by now you know I love to do this. Remember, this is not rehearsal, this is your life. The person who wants to do something finds a way, the other finds an excuse. Now go out there and make it happen. Thank you, Magnum Energy Solutions and Engineered Tax Services and EarlyShares. I’m out. Thank you everybody.
