Diagnostic Mammograms

{text:bookmark-start} Mammograms {text:bookmark-end} Mammograms are important to have because it not only affects women over 40, but it affects young and men also. A mammogram (also called a mammography exam) is a safe, low-dose x-ray of the breast. A high-quality mammogram is the most effective tool for detecting breast cancer early. Early detection of breast cancer may allow more treatment options. It could even mean saving your breast or your life. Mammograms are probably the most important tool doctors have to help them diagnose, evaluate, and follow women who've had breast cancer. Mammograms don't prevent breast cancer, but they can save lives by finding breast cancer as early as possible. There are four important things to know

Masson conducts a point in her article explaining that some women experience false positive mammograms and treated unnecessarily. She references from the Nordic Cochrane Centre information pamphlet that states “These women will have either a part of their breast or the whole breast removed, and they will often receive radiotherapy, and sometimes chemotherapy” (Masson, 2010). This can harvest a psychological strain on many women and cause increased distress and anxiety. Along with the emotional strain, direct financial costs to health services will be applied due to unnecessary procedures.

"According to the American Cancer Society, a mammogram is an x-ray exam of the breast that is used to detect and evaluate breast changes"("What is a mammogram?). This has shown an improvement in technology being that X-rays in the past were more dangerous because they gave out more radiation. Mammograms used today use less radiation than the one in the past and differs from other X-rays done on arms, legs, and teeth because they use less image quality.

Currently mammography and ultrasound are basic imaging techniques for detection and localization of breast tumor. Breast Ultrasound is a typically painless medical test that uses reflected sound waves for further evaluation of a breast abnormality or a specific area seen on mammography. Ultrasound can locate and measure abnormalities or changes to determine if a breast lump is solid or filled with fluid. A mammogram is an x-ray of the breast which may find tumors that are too small to feel. Women aged 40 to 74 years should have annual screening mammograms to lower chance of dying from breast cancer(2,15).Mammograms are less likely to find breast tumors in women younger than 50 years. This may

Mammograms are breast cancer screenings and are of great importance since they detect if indeed a malignant tumor is present and if so what stage it is in (Stephan, 2010). Cancers can be detected at stages I, II, or IIA (Haas et al., 2008).

Over the past two decades, mammography has become the central tool used to detect cancerous regions within the breast. This evolution has been enabled by advancements in the technology itself and its implementation into healthcare regulations of numerous countries around the world (Pisano et al., 2004). In its beginning stages, breast cancer is a relatively treatable disease, and increased awareness for both mammograms and self-breast examinations have led to earlier diagnoses. Studies suggest that increases in mammography screenings have been one of the main reasons that breast

Early detection by screening for breast masses involves a three pronged approach: mammography, breast self-examination, clinical breast examination. Women should have a baseline mammography screening beginning at the age forty. Women who are at a high risk for breast cancer should have a yearly exam beginning at age the age of thirty. A mammography is an X-ray that allows health care professionals to examine the breast tissue for any suspicious areas. Mammograms can often show a breast abnormality before it can be self-detected. The clinical breast exam is performed by a healthcare professional that is trained to recognize different types of abnormalities and risk factors. The clinical breast exams are conducted in-office, typically completed by a family physician or gynecologist at your annual exam. A self-breast exam is something women should do once a month at home. Breast self-exams help you become familiar with how your

In today’s society, women are not getting their mammograms done because they feel they are not necessary or because they are afraid of the results of the mammograms. Since women do not get their mammograms done, they are exposed to breast cancer. According to the National Cancer Institute, women who get mammograms, reduce about “15% to 20% in mortality from breast cancer” (“National Cancer Institute” 1). If women would increase the rate of getting mammograms, there will be less deaths in women.

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of death in women in the United States. A mammogram, is a simple test done with x-ray, to screen women for abnormalities of the breast. Over the past six years, the guidelines put out by various healthcare organizations have changed multiple times on when women should begin screening mammograms. Based on statistical data collected by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), 20 percent of women go without a screening mammogram for their own various reasons, of which may be lack of insurance, lack of time or lack of knowledge as to when they should be getting a screening mammogram done due to the recent changes in recommendations. The utilization of annual screening mammograms beginning at age 40 will continue to help reduce the incidence rate of women with breast cancer, or catch it early enough so that treatment can be sought.

The Author reports that the new recommended age for mammograms, by the United States Preventative Services Task Force, has changed from 50 to 40 to reduce the harm from over screening and overtreatment. It also reports that self-breast examinations are no longer recommended on a regular basis. This recommendation comes from evidence that there are no major benefits of early screenings and that only “one cancer death is prevented for every 1,904 women” screened, age 40 to 49. Conversely, there is evidence that frequent early screenings can lead to overtreatment

Dr. Welch made a lot of sense in his argument against the use of mammography for population screening, however, I can imagine that he is probably getting a lot of heat form proponents for the use of mammography as a main source of breast cancer screenings in women. There is a lot of money involved in the use of mammography today, and those stakeholders aren’t going to be happy if the use of mammography is reduced or halted; after all, it is still an effective tool in early detection of breast cancer.

The disadvantage of compression in mammography is that it can cause some discomfort for the client. GE has addressed this by designing the compression paddles with a rounded bucky shape to increase comfort (GE Healthcare 2016). The compression plates of the GE Essential are motorised, but can also be operated manually (GE Healthcare 2016). They have an automatic stop when compression reaches 200 Newtons (Hogg, Kelly and Mercer 2015, 128). The benefits of compression in mammography include: Better spatial resolution as magnification and focal spot blurring is reduced, reduced motion blur, less scattered radiation due to the shorter beam path length, improved image uniformity and less exposure time due to the smaller anatomy (Hogg, Kelly and Mercer 2015, 128). These benefits maximise clinical utilisation by decreasing patient radiation dose and making the pathology easier to detect. Radiation dose is reduced as the reduced beam path length allows lower energy x-rays to be utilised. This means that there is greater subject contrast and pathology buried in glandular tissues can be better visualized, particularly for malignant tissues (Hogg, Kelly and Mercer 2015, 128). Compression is important for efficient image acquisition and the GE Essential features an ergonomic design to allow for

Three-quarters of all breast cancer patients are not in any of the groups considered at increased risk for breast cancer, indicating that not all risk factors are understood. As a result, doctors recommend that every woman should familiarize herself with the techniques for monthly breast self-examination. X-ray examination of the breasts, a technique called mammography, can detect tumors before they are large enough to be felt and increase the odds for successful treatment. The American Cancer Society recommends that women over age 40

cancer. The use of film mammography can be very hard to recognize breast cancer in

Mammography is a kind of imaging technique in medical imaging science, which is frequently used in women for detecting breast cancer [reference]. It involves X-ray exams of breasts that are used to detect abnormalities and suspicious areas. Currently, mammograms are read by radiologists who visually investigate mammograms to find out the presence of abnormality. Manual reading may be includes false readings due to human errors. For instance: non-cancerous lesions can be interpreted as cancer that is called False Positive (FP) while cancer might be ignored wrongly; it is called False Negative (FN) [5]. In order to achieve reasonable accuracy detection, Computer-Aided Detection (CADe) and Computer-Aided Diagnosis (CADx) systems have been introduced