Every year in Australia it is estimated that 1500 Australian women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer and more than 850 women will die of the disease.

Ovarian cancer is the sixth most common cause of cancer death in women.
It is now more common than cervical cancer and it kills many more women.

About 75 per cent of women who are diagnosed will be at an advanced stage, where the cancer has spread and is very difficult to treat successfully.

When ovarian cancer is diagnosed at an early stage the outlook is very good, with as many as 90 per cent of patients being cured.

There are no reliable early detection tests for ovarian cancer, so awareness is a womans best defence.

Ovarian Cancer needs to be considered if a woman experiences one or more of the following symptoms more than 12 times in one month and therefore a GP needs to consider ovarian cancer as a possibility:

-Bloating, swelling and a feeling of fullness in your stomach
-Unexplained abdominal or back pain
-Feeling full / difficulty eating
-Increased urinary urgency