Amy Robach: 'GMA' anchor found breast cancer via on-air mammogram

Nov 11, 2013 | 4:11 PM

Amy Robach may owe her life to a health segment on "Good Morning America."

The 40-year-old newswoman, an anchor for ABC's morning show, discovered she has breast cancer after having what she thought was a routine mammogram for an October piece on the show.

Turns out the procedure wasn't routine at all: Doctors ran more tests and confirmed a cancer diagnosis. Robach says she will have a double mastectomy on Thursday.

"The doctors told me bluntly: 'That mammogram just saved your life,'" Robach wrote in an essay that ran on the ABC News website.

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Robach said she had never had a mammogram before and had been reluctant to undergo the procedure this time but was persuaded by coworkers including "GMA's" Robin Roberts, a cancer survivor herself.

"I got lucky by catching it early, and there are so many people to thank for making sure I did," Robach wrote. "Every producer, every person who urged me to do this, changed my trajectory."

She added that she hopes her tale will "inspire every woman who hears it to get a mammogram, to take a self exam. No excuses. It is the difference between life and death."

What do you think of Robach and her experience?

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