(ARA) – It only takes a single call to help save a life – maybe yours.
“Don’t wait. Pick up the phone and make an appointment for a breast screening exam today.” That’s the advice of Dr. Richard G. Barr, professor of radiology at Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine and Radiology Consultants, Inc. in Youngstown, Ohio, who credits new imaging technologies with saving the lives of thousands of women through early detection of breast cancer.
According to the American Cancer Society, if breast cancer is caught before it reaches the lymph nodes, the five-year survival rate is well over 90 percent – so timing is everything.
The American Cancer Society (ACS) recommends breast self-exams for women starting in their 20s, with yearly mammograms after the age of 40. More comprehensive clinical breast exams should be part of a breast health regimen every three years for women in the 20s and 30s and every year for women 40 and older. Some women may need more frequent testing at an earlier age because of genetic or family risk factors, so the ACS suggests women talk with their doctors to determine the breast cancer screening routine that’s right for them.
“The first step is a mammogram,” Dr. Barr says, “but, today, there’s a whole new world of imaging options for each stage of the breast care cycle – from diagnosis and treatment to managing and monitoring the disease.” That’s good news for the more than 200,000 women who will be diagnosed with breast cancer each year.
“When doctors are looking for answers, it helps to have more than one way to find them,” says Pam Benkert, vice president and general manager of Women’s Health care, Philips Healthcare, one of the global leaders in state-of-the-art imaging systems.
Today, breast cancer specialists have multiple ways of getting the information they need to help make accurate diagnosis and determine appropriate care. The process begins with a mammogram, but now they’ve gone from analog to digital, providing significantly better contrast for both doctors’ and computer-aided diagnoses.
Breast cancer screening is rapidly moving to a multi-option, solution-driven approach. New innovations in ultrasound imaging, for example, deliver crisp, high-definition images that help doctors make confident diagnoses. Results from a 2008 study published in The Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA) testing the effectiveness of combining mammography with ultrasound, found the use of both types of screening increased diagnostic accuracy from 78 percent to 91 percent.
Major advances in MRI technology are also producing precise images which are critically important for high risk women or those with dense breast tissue. Often a supplemental procedure, MRI’s are used for a myriad of diagnostic assessments such as determining tumor locations for women undergoing breast conservation surgery and assessing whether cancer has spread.
Today, these new technologies and others on the way, can detect breast cancer before it reaches a critical stage or pinpoint a tumor while it can be removed.
Benkert says, “Never before has there been greater hope for women diagnosed with breast cancer. Thanks to technology, a single image can change a woman’s life.”
There are more than two-and-a-half million breast cancer survivors in the U.S. Get a mammogram. Do it today. You’ve got technology on your side.
