Graphic Medicine
Home / breast cancer

LDComics in-person event featuring Hayley Gullen. London 15th October.

by

UK graphic medicine folks! Make a note of this London live event by our friends, LDComics. On Thursday, 15th of October at the Cartoon Museum. One of the speakers is Hayley Gullen, who recently published her graphic memoir, This might surprise you: a breast cancer story, which was shortlisted for the Graphic Medicine book awards this year. As well as charting moments of her journey, there are some insightful reflections about health in the UK and the dynamics between patient and healthcare workers. The event is at the wonderful Cartoon Museum. If you are in or around London this is a great… Read More

Best Breasts in the West

by

By Maria Fitzgerald   Each chapter of this medical related memoir shows a different vignette from Trishelle Jeffery’s life. Many chapters concern a fibroadenoma in Jeffery’s breast. The book opens on Jeffery discovering a lump in her breast. As different incidents in Jeffery’s life unfold, we see that she is a student in college, and that she has a job as a nude model for life drawing classes. In one chapter we learn about how Jeffery allowed a sculptor to apply insulation foam on her torso as he tried to make a mold, for a cast of her.  She is… Read More

This Might Surprise You – A Breast Cancer Story

by

by Janet Chan Hayley Gullen’s This Might Surprise You details her journey being diagnosed with early onset HER2 positive breast cancer. She starts with finding her breast lump and takes us through her experience being diagnosed and enduring multiple treatments. Breast cancer is one of the most diagnosed cancers in women globally with an estimated 2.3 million women diagnosed in 2022 (WHO, 2025). Early onset breast cancer is when breast cancer is diagnosed before age 50 and its incidence is on the rise (Brown, n.d.). HER2 positive breast cancer is a quickly growing cancer that accounts for about 20% of… Read More

Spotlight: Adrift on a Painted Sea, by Tim Bird. Kickstarter.

by

Name: Tim Bird Website: www.timothybird.co.uk Instagram: @timothybird Publisher: Avery Hill Publishing AHP website: www.averyhillpublishing.com AHP Instagram: @averyhillpublishing Kickstarter campaign: Adrift on a Painted Sea My name’s Tim Bird – I’m an illustrator from Winchester in the UK. I’ve been making and self-publishing comics for around 10 years, and published a graphic novel called The Great North Wood with Avery Hill Publishing in 2018. My new graphic novel, called Adrift on a Painted Sea, is currently being crowdfunded on Kickstarter by Avery Hill Publishing. The book is about my mum – her love of painting and of the sea. She had been painting all… Read More

Medical Mentions Book Review VII

by

Medical Mentions is a group of graphic works. The graphic works reviewed here are books whose primary topics are not medical, and yet they cover a medical topic with some depth at some point in the work. The rest of the work might be fictional or nonfictional, while the medical portion is often technical and five pages or more. The reviewer will usually neither recommend nor discourage reading the work, except when the rest of the work is deemed outstanding or terrible, respectively. Typically, six graphic works will be part of the review with one paragraph for each. Prior Medical Mentions… Read More

Bobby Baker Diary Drawings Mental Illness and Me

by

Guest Review by Katya Robin Bobby Baker is an artist who makes installations and does performances about women’s daily lives. She was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD; Endnote 1) in 1997.  When she started going to a mental health day centre, diary drawing became a core element of her daily art practice and self-care. Her self-imposed daily drawing continued for the next eleven years, thereafter changing to weekly updates. Over this time, she included a series of more than 700 drawings. A selection of 158 photographs of these drawings were exhibited at The Wellcome Collection (Endnote 2) in 2009…. Read More

‘Cancer Sells’ by Tat Effby

by

Tat is a cartoonist and illustrator, whose work has appeared in Private Eye, the Oldie, the Guardian and as Cath Tate Cards. She is a regular contributor to My Shrewsbury Magazine, home to her strip ‘Round the Bend’, based on the wildfowl on Shrewsbury’s stretch of the river Severn. Tat lives in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, with a husband and two sons (probably hers) who like to break things so she has something to do.  Instagram & Twitter : @tat_effby www.tat-effby.com