At one point in time, regular mammograms were the recommendation of all major medical associations and doctors. Patients were to start getting a mammogram at 40 years of age and continue getting one each year as routine testing for breast cancer. However, the latest guidelines suggest fewer mammograms, but is that really few enough considering the risks?
Latest Recommendations
The American Cancer Society is now recommending women start getting a mammogram at 45 years of age. The American Cancer Society states women should be able to start as early as 40 if they want, though. It’s only advised women screen yearly until the age of 55. At 55, experts now recommend women should only have a mammogram every other year.
Inaccurate Screening
Doctors aren’t able to distinguish a harmful tumor from a benign one by merely a manual examination of the breasts, so mammograms do remain as the more accurate way to check for breast cancer. However, mammograms aren’t a flawless testing practice either. When the initial mammogram detects an abnormality, the patient must undergo further testing, which consists of additional mammograms or possibly other imaging, only for results to indicate the mass wasn’t cancerous.
For many women, breast screenings cause a great deal of anxiety. Breast masses are a common occurrence but are rarely cancerous, as noted by the National Cancer Institute. Therefore, women who have a mass stress until further testing is conducted when the doctor determines the mass was benign.
Breastcancer.org states approximately 80 percent of women who have a biopsy for a suspicious mass don’t have cancer, meaning only 20 percent of the women screened actually have a malignant mass.
Mammograms given to younger women are less accurate. Younger women have more glands and ligaments than older women; therefore, they have more breast tissue, making results uncertain in many cases.
Mammograms Aren’t Helping
A study documented by the Mayo Clinic indicated, despite the increase in early diagnoses from mammograms, the number of women diagnosed with advanced stages of breast cancer hasn’t declined. Moreover, some of the cases of early breast cancer detected may not have ever affected the woman’s health. Ultimately, this means women receive treatment that has dangerous side effects that could negatively impact the woman’s health for no reason.
Breast cancer treatment may consist of chemotherapy or a surgery to remove the mass. Chemotherapy drugs like doxorubicin or docetaxel treat breast cancer in its early stages. Other drugs like carboplatin, fluorouracil and cyclophosphamide may be used in conjunction with these chemotherapy medications.
Chemotherapy drugs work by targeting cells and eliminating them. While they’re effective at attacking the harmful cells, chemo will also harm noncancerous cells. If you have hard-to-find veins, the drugs will be administered via a catheter.
These drugs cause side effects like a loss of appetite, nausea, bleeding, diarrhea, vomiting, fatigue and weakness. Mouth sores, weight gain, weight loss, early menopause and an increased risk of infection are possible as well. The drugs attack the healthy hair cells, so your hair may fall out. Doctors administer chemo via a pill or intravenously daily, weekly or every two to four weeks, which is highly inconvenient, especially if it’s not necessary.
Dangers of Mammograms
Mammograms aren’t 100-percent safe. When administered, the doctor conducts two x-rays, which contain radiation. Repeated mammograms have the ability to cause cancer. The radiation mutates cells. For those who already have cancer, the radiation can spread cancer. Mammograms expose your body to a higher level of radiation than a standard chest x-ray, 1,000 times greater to be exact.
The Breast Cancer Organization indicates radiation increases the risk of cancer in women. It increases a woman’s risk by one percent for every additional unit of radiation a woman is exposed to. According to the Department of Epidemiology and Radiology at the University Medical Center Groningen in the Netherlands, women who were at a high risk for cancer had an average rate increase 1.5 times higher than women who were high risk and weren’t exposed to radiation.
The Department of Epidemiology and Radiology also stated high-risk women who had a mammogram before the age of 20 or who had five or more mammograms were 2.5 times likely to develop breast cancer than high-risk women who weren’t exposed. Harvard Medical School discovered a woman is at a 7.4-times greater risk for heart disease per each one gray unit of radiation.
Bottom line is the establishment is telling you to get more and earlier screening for breast cancer, but what they are leaving out is these screenings are likely to increase your risk of developing the deadly disease.
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