Famed music manager Mathew Knowles says he recognized that he had symptoms of male breast cancer after years of selling mammography equipment.
The music executive and father of Beyoncé and Solange was a guest of the Tuesday (June 30) episode of podcast Outlaws with T.S. Madison, where he spoke on his early detection of breast cancer in 2019.
According to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation of Alabama, Knowles carried a Stage 1A BRCA2 gene mutation and quickly underwent treatment by receiving a surgical mastectomy which removed the cancer.
Around the 34-minute mark of the video below, Knowles explained that he “gratefully” knew “a lot about breast cancer” because he sold mammography equipment while working for Xerox.
“I knew when I had discharge in my chest area that that was a high probability [and] called my doctor,” he told Madison, adding that he was the first man to ask his doctor for a mammogram.
“Early detection is so critically important. And I'm grateful I was stage 1A. That saved my life,” Knowles said. “The universe wanted me for some reason to save my life by selling equipment that one day saved my life.”
He also noted that Destiny’s Child classic “Survivor” was his anthem during the cancer battle.
According to advocacy organization Susan G. Komen, roughly 2,700 men in the U.S. are diagnosed with invasive breast cancer.
“It's one of those things men don't like to talk about because society has made us think we can't talk about it,” Knowles said. “I'm just the opposite. If I can save someone's life today, then that makes today really special.”
Knowles’ ex, Tina Knowles, last year revealed in her debut memoir Matriarch that she had been diagnosed with Stage 1 breast cancer after missing a mammogram. The entrepreneur is now cancer-free.
