New research finds
that getting regular mammograms before you’re 50 just
might save your life.
Remember that
recommendation that women put off getting their first mammogram until age 50?
Well, many experts believe it’s bad advice -- especially since a new study has
found that women in their 40s with no family history of breast cancer are just
as likely to get breast cancer as those with the disease on the family tree.
That means that
if you wait until you’re 50 to get your first mammogram, as recommended, your
breast cancer might not be caught until it’s “larger, more difficult to treat
and more likely to have spread,”
says researcher Stamatia V. Destounis, a radiologist at Elizabeth Wende Breast
Care LLC in Rochester, N.Y., who revealed the findings of her study at the
recent annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).
Destounis and her
colleagues looked at a decade’s worth of the mammograms of women between 40 and
49 with -- and without -- a history of breast cancer. When they compared the
number of new cancers, as well as how many were invasive and had spread, they
found that 63.2 percent of women with a family history had developed the
disease, as well as a strikingly similar 64 percent of those who had no family
history. In addition, an almost identical number in both groups had developed
metastatic cancer, meaning the cancer had spread to their lymph nodes.
Cut Your Risk of Death in Half
The American Cancer
Society calls for a yearly mammogram starting at age 40. In fact, a study just
published in December 2011 found that having just three mammograms reduces the
risk of dying from breast cancer by 49 percent. But in 2009, the U.S. Preventive
Services Task Force (USPSTF) -- a group of health experts that has reviewed
hundreds of medical studies -- claimed that mammograms before 50 were
unnecessary and got widespread press coverage, confusing women.
The USPSTF acknowledged that mammograms save lives. But their expert opinion was that the benefits didn’t outweigh the risks, which include unnecessary biopsies and treatment for non-life-threatening tumors.
Increased risk of
death versus an annoying, unnecessary test? Like Destounis, you may think that
the task force is “not dealing with reality.” Mammography among 40-somethings
has always been spotty and by 2008 was already taking a downward swing,
according to statistics gathered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Applying these new numbers to the equation could lead to an uptick in breast
cancer deaths in women who develop cancer in their 40s but don’t discover it until
it is literally too late.
My advice: Don’t
wait.
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Good advice!
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