LOS ANGELES - Ellen DeGeneres has recorded a series of phone messages that amount to an urgent wake-up call for women: Help yourself fight breast cancer.
The messages, which can be delivered by online request, are intended to nudge women to take steps to check for the disease that is the second-most lethal kind of cancer in women after lung cancers.
"I went into a studio and recorded a million different (versions): 'Hi, this is Ellen DeGeneres and your sister told me to remind you that it's Breast Cancer Awareness Month,' 'Your teacher told me to call you,' 'Your neighbour told me to call you,' 'Your cousin,' 'Your mother."'
DeGeneres, who was asked by vitamin maker One A Day to join the company's campaign that started Thursday, said she finds an anti-breast cancer program to support each year. One A Day also is donating money to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation.
"My mom, 30 years ago, had a mastectomy. It's changed my life because I'm highly aware I'm vulnerable to this disease and I get a mammogram every year," DeGeneres said.
A recent study indicates that the number of women over 40 getting annual mammograms is declining, DeGeneres said, which she finds worrisome.
The American Cancer Society is among the groups sponsoring October's national breast cancer awareness effort.
DeGeneres plans to devote time to the issue on her talk show, "Ellen," with celebrities who have been affected by breast cancer to appear. As part of the phone message campaign, "Ellen" is inviting women to tell their own breast-cancer stories for possible use on the show.
DeGeneres herself is at a high point in her life. "Ellen" just kicked off its sixth season - "We're calling it 'Sexy Season Six' ... What that means yet, I don't know" - and recently wed Portia De Rossi after a California Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage.
"I keep saying 'my girlfriend,' but I have to go to 'wife,"' DeGeneres said.
"My show is going to stay the same," she said. "My heart just feels a little bit different, softer and somehow more in love. I don't know how. But it just feels really romantic and lovely. I just feel really blessed."
A measure calling for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage has been placed on the November ballot by opponents.
