DANGERS OF SCREENING MAMMOGRAPHY

UPDATE: 18 March

Thermography
A new resource if you are in So. California -
IT'S HARD TO BELIEVE, BUT...
* Breast Cancer is the most common form of cancer among American women.
* Nearly 41,000 women die of Breast Cancer every year in the U.S. and and every year more and more young women are being diagnosed.
* Over 2,000 men are also affected by Breast Cancer.
* Out of some 800,000 biopsies that are done every year, over 180,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer... the rest are benign lumps.
* There is more than one type of breast cancer; you DO NOT need a lump to have breast cancer (IBC).
* Although rare, implants have been known to rupture during mammography.
* Women with dense breast tissue (usually younger women) is harder to detect breast cancers on mammograms.
* "...since mammographic screening was introduced in 1983, the incidence of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), which represents 12% of all breast cancer cases, has increased by 328%, and 200% of this increase is due to the use of mammography. This increase is for all women: Since the inception of widespread mammographic screening, the increase for women under the age of 40 has gone up over 3000%."
* Once a tumor has grown to a sufficient size, detectable by either a mammogram or physicial examination, it has been growing for several years and achieved more than 25 doubles of the malignant cell colony.
* You have the right to investigate other safe screening methods, such as Thermography.

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According to the Cancer Prevention Coalition, since passage of the 1971 National Cancer Act, the overall incidence of cancer in the U.S. has escalated to epidemic proportions, now striking 1.3 million, and killing about 550,000 annually. The median age for the diagnosis of cancer is 67 in adults, and six in children.

Samuel Epstein, MD is a distinguished physician based in the Chicago area, who is a founder of the Cancer Prevention Coalition. Chicago is also the base of Harpo Studios, Oprah's production company.

Dr. Epstein is professor emeritus of Environmental and Occupational Medicine at the University of Illinois School of Public Health, and Chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition. He is an internationally recognized authority on avoidable causes of cancer, particularly unknowing exposures to industrial carcinogens in air, water, the workplace, and consumer products--food, cosmetics and toiletries, and household products including pesticides--besides carcinogenic prescription drugs.

Dr. Epstein worked closely with a wonderful doctor and colleague of mine, John Gofman, PhD, MD, on the issues surrounding screening mammogram and the increase in the incidence of breast cancer related to this disease.

According to Dr. Epstein,

"no nation other than the United States routinely screens premenopausal women by mammography. In this context, it may be noted that the January 1997 National Institutes of Health Consensus Conference recommended against premenopausal screening (24), a decision that the NCI, but not the ACS, accepted (4). However, under pressure from Congress and the ACS, the NCI reversed its decision some three months later in favor of premenopausal screening. The U.S. overkill extends to the standard practice of taking two or more mammograms per breast annually in postmenopausal women. This contrasts with the more restrained European practice of a single view every two to three years (4)."

It would be very beneficial to women's health and "Best Life" if Oprah would move from the closed thinking on this issue and be more proactive in the effort to prevent and cure breast cancer by interviewing Dr. Epstein on her program. Inviting Dr. Sherry Tenpenny to join in the discussion would disseminate more information about the benefits of thermography over mammogram.

Allowing Dr. Oz to promote annual screening mammogram only brings more suffering to women, especially when there are much more effective screening methods available that do not promote the increased incidence of breast cancer and the associated risk of thyroid and heart problems, secondary to cumulative exposure to radiation.

In March we will be posting more information such as we posted last fall during the "Race for the Cure" frenzy.

In the interim, should you wish more information about the well known hazards of screening mammogram, please order the Creating Health Institute's Healthy Handout© on this topic.