Death Spiral for Mammograms Continues 

Controversial evidence about mammogram screenings has been available for decades, if we searched for it.  Today, we don't even have to look.  The news is on ABC[1], in the NY times[2], CNN[3] and all over the internet. The same information is repeated and repeated....mammograms have drawbacks.  We are using them at a high cost; helping find one woman with breast cancer while over-diagnosing 200 women with fear and anxiety and causing hundreds of thousands of needless biopsies, mastectomies, and chemo treatments.  

The color of our breast awareness campaign should really be green-for the big bucks being made at the expense of our breasts!  Over 800,000 needless biopsies are done yearly according to Dr. Christine Horner[4], at a cost of $12,000 to $20,000 each. Approximately 38.7 million mammogram procedures are done in the United States each year, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. In one survey, nearly 75% of women over the age of 40 reported having a mammogram in the past two years. Many of them also needed a sonogram and then another mammogram 6 months later to "make sure" the small lump they saw on the x-ray wasn't dangerous.  The tests have spawned a multi-billion dollar industry.

In 2009, the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force changed the mammogram recommendations from every year beginning at the age of 40 to every two years beginning at 50.  In case you have forgotten, the outrage and backlash over this was unbelievable, with most of  the medical community declining to make such a change.   The task force actually backed down and changed their wording to say, "a mammogram should be a very private decision between a woman and her doctor."   

My clients tell me that the medical community seemed to step up their insistence on mammograms even after recommendations changed. Many 40 year olds were getting nasty letters from their doctors to come in and get their first mammogram.  I suppose it is a little scary to think that the endless money stream you calculated for a multi-million dollar imaging center is at risk! 

Now, the same thing is happening all over.  The naysayers are questioning the 25 year old study done with 90,000 women first published in the prestigious British Medical Journal[5]  They harp that the study doesn't reflect Tamoxifen, a newer breast cancer drug that must be magic.  Somehow it can prevent breast cancer, but it is known to cause cervical, liver and uterine cancer. They say that study has been discredited in many other ways just throw doubts into our minds and continue to pile up the green stuff.

1.  Mammograms use x-rays.[6]  The National Cancer Institute[7] lists radiation as one of the top 4 causes of breast cancer.  A cut and paste from their web site says it all.

Ionizing radiation: Based on solid evidence, exposure of the breast to ionizing radiation is associated with an increased risk of developing breast cancer, starting 10 years after exposure and persisting lifelong. Risk depends on dose and age at exposure, with the highest risk occurring during puberty. Magnitude of Effect: Variable, but approximately a six-fold increase in incidence overall.

2. Mammograms place women with genetic risk factors at more risk.  Radiation will mutate weak genes.      

3.  Mammograms miss 40-50% of breast cancers in women with dense breasts.  Approximately one in two women have dense breasts.  Ironically, after 10 years of mammograms your density may change - no doubt 50 pounds of pressure per mammogram causes changes.  Check out areyoudense.org and one woman's efforts that have significantly changed legislature in 12 states.  Those doctors are now mandated to tell us if we have dense breasts...but we still have to educate our doctors as some are simply recommending more mammograms! Sadly all women in all states do not have equal breast health information.

4.  Mammograms are over-diagnosing. In the study "1 in 424 women who had mammograms received unnecessary cancer treatment, including surgery, chemotherapy and radiation."  The figures don't tell us that 101 women from this study became disfigured for no reason...Now multiply this times millions of women every year for decades.

5.  Mammograms did not find more lumps than a clinical exam. The Canadian study figures showed that the similar amounts of cancers were found in each group.

6  Mammograms are not early detection, although we are told they are.  According to the Journal of Surgical Oncology, a breast cancer growth has 4-10 billion cells before a mammogram can detect it. Cancer cells double approximately every 90 days....so an average cancer growth is always 10 years old and may have spread through other parts of the body before it is found by a mammogram.

Breast Research Awareness and Support was created to educate women about these limitations and provide thermography- a safe, painless, radiation-free health screening.

Please share this information with all your friends and Think Beyond Pink.  Say no to the green-ery surrounding our breast health.