The value of my life

[nontacitare]

http://www.miamiherald.com/living/health/story/1337124.html

If I'd followed this advice I'd be dead now. My cancer was caught by a base-line mammogram when I was 39.

The scientific analysis also found that to save one woman's life, 1,904 women need to

Comments

[nontacitare]

they mentioned the part about "does not apply to women at high risk". I think that would've included you,

Except that I wasn't high risk at the time. High risk means having had cancer before or having one of the known genetic mutations. The only risk factor I had in my 30s was a mother who'd had breast cancer when she was 43. Since 85% of breast cancers are not related to genetics, it wasn't even enough to get me genetically tested. The current standards, which saved my life, are an annual mammogram starting at 40 or 10 years prior to the initial diagnosis of breast cancer in a mother or sister.

So according to this goverment study, the chances of my developing breast cancer at 39 were so unlikely that there was no point in me getting a mammogram until I was 50. Granted, after my mother's uterine cancer and second breast cancer I would have gotten genetically tested and placed into the high risk category "allowed" to get mammograms early, but my tumor was Grade III, the fast-spreading kind. A mammogram two years later would have been too late.

[rfunk]

What I heard on the radio was something along the lines of "no other risk factors." Family history is a risk factor. And apparently the specific recommendation says, "Note these recommendations are intended for those who do not have signs or symptoms, or family history of breast cancer." Your mother's previous cancer specifically eliminates you from the majority who they're saying shouldn't worry about it until 50.

[nontacitare]

"Note these recommendations are intended for those who do not have signs or symptoms, or family history of breast cancer."

Fair enough. I missed the bit about family history in the article I read.

However, my mom's first cancer was caught by her baseline mammogram, and that was well before she was 50. In fact, a fair number of women with breast cancer learn about it either from self-exams or their first mammogram. And it's known that mammograms detect breast cancer and save lives of 30 and 40 something women, even if they also detect non-cancerous lumps.

There is no decent medical reason for preventing women from getting mammograms before age 50.