New Mammogram Recommendations

By now you all have seen or heard about the new recommendations on when women should now have their mammograms and how often.  According to the old recommendations, you were recommended to have it done once a year (or every other year) starting at age 40 or at age 35 if Breast Cancer was in your family.  I don’t really know the specifics since it’s not been in our family and I’m not 40 yet.  Anyway, the new recommendations are now age 50 and every other year or every year depending on which article you read.

According to The New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/17/health/17cancer.html?_r=1:

The new recommendations, which do not apply to a small group of women with unusual risk factors for breast cancer, reverse longstanding guidelines and are aimed at reducing harm from overtreatment, the group says. It also says women age 50 to 74 should have mammograms less frequently — every two years, rather than every year. And it said doctors should stop teaching women to examine their breasts on a regular basis.

Now, since this isn’t an issue for me, it doesn’t really effect me, however it does piss me off a bit.  I have read and heard so many people saying that if they had waited, they’d be dead or it would have been too late for them because the cancer would be so far into them that nothing would help them.  How in the world can you not recommend women to have this screening when people in their 30′s and 40′s are being diagnosed and now you are recommending that doctors stop teaching women how to do a self breast exam?  Do they not realize that many women go to the doctor for testing because THEY felt a lump?  Do they not realize or just not care if people are diagnosed early enough to do something about it?

But what really gets me is there are patients out there, who have been diagnosed who are now canceling their surgeries and treatments because of these new recommendations Are you really that fricken stupid?  Yeah, that’s right, women who have been diagnosed with Breast Cancer are canceling their appointments for surgery and/or treatments!

According to ABC News (http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/health&id=7125827):

In New York, one woman who had already been diagnosed with breast cancer cancelled her surgery after hearing the new report.

“She did because, at 41-years-old, the guidelines don’t recommend a screening mammogram. Therefore she decided that if anything was found on her screening mammogram, it must be insignificant and it didn’t need to be treated. And that’s scary,” Dr. Laurie Kirstein of Beth Israel Medical Center said.

Yeah, that’s really smart! Because some dumb ass tells you that you really didn’t need the screening yet because you aren’t 50, your cancer isn’t significant enough to need the treatment YOUR DOCTOR TOLD YOU THAT YOU NEEDED!

Let’s just face the true fact.  The insurance companies are tired of paying for women to have these screenings every year, so they are getting U.S. Preventive Services Task Force to change the recommendation to 50 so they don’t have to pay for more women to have this screening.  Yes, another way for the insurance companies to SCREW women.  It’s bad enough we pay more money in premiums for our insurance than men, but now we could be denied the screening that could save our life!

Just remember, this is the same government who is trying to get Healthcare for everyone in the US!