What research should we be doing?
Hello BCNA community! This is my first post. I'm a scientist working on breast cancer and I was looking through some of the threads here and it strikes me that the issues we scientists think are the i...
Forum Discussion
@arpie NZ developed a great breast density 4 point rating scale that @wingman refers to earlier in this thread. Here is a pic. As you know WA informs women with a letter stating that their breast density has compromised the reading of their mammography images (Level 3 and 4 here). There are not a load of stressed WA women running about flailing their arms around not knowing what to do. The letter suggests that the woman seeks medical advice and has further testing.
Dense breasts is completely normal - 40-50% of women have dense breasts over 50 years of age, and 50-60% (40-49) so imagine how many women are uninformed of the risk that they are carrying around on their chest (higher breast density = greater risk of BC) and think that their mammogram has been successful in clearing them of cancer or finding 'no evidence of disease'. No evidence of bloody anything! Like trying to find a polar bear in a snow storm.
Dr Liz Wylie (Medical Director of BreastScreen Australia) is responsible for the difference over here. Thank God someone is on the ball and believes it is a woman's right to know. I think it is completely negligent to mislead women like this.
Once 3D Tomosynthesis mammography becomes commonplace in BreastScreens across the country, diagnosis rats will increase too. At the moment they are only in assessment (recall) centres here in WA and I think that is true for the rest of the country as well..
Dense breasts is completely normal - 40-50% of women have dense breasts over 50 years of age, and 50-60% (40-49) so imagine how many women are uninformed of the risk that they are carrying around on their chest (higher breast density = greater risk of BC) and think that their mammogram has been successful in clearing them of cancer or finding 'no evidence of disease'. No evidence of bloody anything! Like trying to find a polar bear in a snow storm.
Dr Liz Wylie (Medical Director of BreastScreen Australia) is responsible for the difference over here. Thank God someone is on the ball and believes it is a woman's right to know. I think it is completely negligent to mislead women like this.
Once 3D Tomosynthesis mammography becomes commonplace in BreastScreens across the country, diagnosis rats will increase too. At the moment they are only in assessment (recall) centres here in WA and I think that is true for the rest of the country as well..