MAMMOGRAPHY

Denise TomekDirector of Diagnostic Imaging

ONE IN EIGHT

• Think of your last family gathering• Think of your card/book/wine club• Look around this room• One in eight women will be affected by breast

cancer in their lifetime. • Will it be you?• Early detection is the key to surviving this

disease.

Risk factors for developing breast cancer

• Being a woman (but men can develop breast cancer too)

• Age – 1 out of 8 invasive breast cancers are found in women younger than 45 years old however 2 out of 3 invasive breast cancers are found in women over 55 years old

• Genetic – 5-10% of all breast cancers are thought to be hereditary, meaning that they result directly from gene defects (called mutations) inherited from a parent.

Risk factors cont’d

• Family history- Having one first-degree relative (mother, sister, or daughter) with breast cancer approximately doubles a woman's risk. Having 2 first-degree relatives increases her risk about 3-fold.

• The exact risk is not known, but women with a family history of breast cancer in a father or brother also have an increased risk of breast cancer. Altogether, less than 15% of women with breast cancer have a family member with this disease. This means that most (over 85%) women who get breast cancer do not have a family history of this disease.

Risk factors cont’d

• Race and Ethnicity- white women are slightly more likely to develop breast cancer than are African-American women, but African-American women are more likely to die of this cancer. However, in women under 45 years of age, breast cancer is more common in African- American women. Asian, Hispanic, and Native-American women have a lower risk of developing and dying from breast cancer.

Risk factors cont’d

• Dense breast tissue- Breasts are made up of fatty tissue, fibrous tissue, and glandular tissue. Someone is said to have dense breast tissue (as seen on a mammogram) when they have more glandular and fibrous tissue and less fatty tissue. Women with dense breasts on mammogram have a risk of breast cancer that is 1.2 to 2 times that of women with average breast density. Dense breast tissue can also make mammograms less accurate.

3D mammography

• Columbus Community Hospital Foundation purchased this machine in April 2015

• Must be accredited by the FDA to do 2D first• Upgrade machine and PACS system• Training for technologists and radiologists• Begin to do patients (tentatively scheduled for

January 2016)

CCH staff with new machine

3D mammography

• Digital tomosynthesis of the breast is different from a standard mammogram in the same way a CT scan of the chest is different from a standard chest X-ray. Or think of the difference between a ball and a circle. One is 3-dimensional, the other is flat.

How does tomo work?

Images

Insurance

• Medicare/Medicaid will pay for 3D• BCBS will not- they consider it experimental• United Healthcare will not- they also consider

it experimental• Each individual should check with their

insurance carrier about coverage before they have their exam done