Sunlen Serfaty Has Preventative Double Mastectomy, Ovaries Removed (Exclusive) [Video]

For 11 years, Sunlen Serfaty watched her older sister battle two bouts of ovarian cancer. Because of the family history — including her late grandmother’s battle with breast cancer — the CNN correspondent was often encouraged by her doctors to get genetic testing. Even so, for a long time that wasn’t a priority, so she never did.

“But it was just this small voice in the back of my head, ‘You should just do this,’” the 43-year-old tells PEOPLE. 

“And I was at my yearly checkup at the gynecologist after having my second baby and she said, ‘Hey, you want to do the blood test today?’ I said yes,” she recalls, of having the testing done in early 2021. “It was just a total whim decision but I think it was many years in the making of this little voice saying, ‘Do this.’” 

A few days later, Serfaty received a …