Mammograms Might Potentially Mean Over - Diagnosis of Breast Cancer
October 23rd, 2009
At the moment breast cancer is the second leading reason for death in girls, after lung cancer. As a consequence, annual breast mammograms became common for ladies over 40, or anyone at heavy risk of getting this dangerous, disfiguring disease.
Now that programs like this are established, experts had anticipated that the number of cases of advanced breast cancer would reduce, but that’s just not happening.
Instead the prevalence of breast cancer seems to have risen since universal screening became part of our yearly examinations. Why?
Ladies know that early identification of breast cancer can reduce deaths, but that doesn’t mean going for that annual mammogram any less stressful or uncomfortable.
We endure the tests as we’ve been told we want to find piles when they’re too tiny to feel or bring symptoms, before they’ve an opportunity to increase and cause difficulty.
But do all cancers lead to concerns?
Late last year a large Norwegian research of mammography screening for breast cancer discovered that some aggressive cancers can spontaneously regress over time, leaving no sign that they were even present in a lady’s body.
Ao it makes you consider, now that we are able to screen for it, if this kind of cancer isn’t over diagnosed or over handled.
This latest BMJ report citing an over-diagnosis rate for aggressive breast cancer of 35% could really have you re-considering that yearly mammogram.
Besides this type of cancer, over-diagnosis has also been mentioned for cancer of the prostate as well as neuroblastoma, melanoma, thyroid cancer and lung cancer.
The newest work on over-diagnosis comes from researchers out of the Nordic Cochrane Centre in Copenhagen.
The researchers analyzed the results of studies that spanned a 14-year period. 7 years before public mammography screenings were available, and seven years after government run mammography-screening programs were in place in 5 different countries ( Great Britain, Canada, New South Wales, Australia, Manitoba, Sweden and areas in Norway )
They found an over-diagnosis rate of 52% for all cancers, 35% for aggressive breast cancer.
The information shows a jump in breast cancer cases shortly after the screening programs were instituted.
What this work counsels, as did the Norwegian study before it, that maybe not all cancers need to be treated, some might grow too slowly to impact a patient and others may resolve on their own.
It is important to understand that no doctor or current screening methodology can tell the difference between a cancer that is’s dangerous and one that isn’t be.
In a BMJ editorial that is’s published along with the research, professor of drugs Dr. H. Gilbert Welch of the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Research understands the issue of over-diagnosis, understanding the injury and fear a woman endures after being given such news by her doctor.
Surgery and chemo bring their own set of problems that are physically stressful and emotionally hard, and a terrible trial for patients and families. Especially those whose cancers may not have required treatment.
While this latest study is still not an reason, or advice, to put off your yearly mammogram, it does raise some rather troubling questions.
Till we know more, each lady has to decide for herself whether to keep on with annual breast mammograms, but it is clear that screening has let us uncover earlier cancers and kick-off appropriate treatment earlier and save many more peoples lives.
Next - just head on over to the Daily Health Bulletin for more information on mammogram results, plus for a limited time get 5 free fantastic health reports. Click here for more details on this mammogram results studies.
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