• On Good Things Utah this morning – Women ages 40 and older should get screened for breast cancer every other year, according to the new recommendations. But doctors think it should be annual. Women should get screened for breast cancer every other year starting at age 40, according to draft guidance issued Tuesday by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. That’s earlier than the independent panel of experts previously recommended: The last guidance, from 2016, suggested biennial screenings starting at age 50, but noted that women in their 40s could talk to their doctor about getting screened, particularly if they have a family history of breast cancer. Screenings usually involve a mammogram, which is an X-ray image of the breast.
  • So are mammograms as scary as they sound? Breast cancer is the second-most common cancer in women in the United States, and it’s responsible for about 30 percent of all new female cancers each year, according to the American Cancer Society. With that, screening for this disease is important — and the gold standard is via mammogram. If you’ve never had a mammogram before, it’s understandable to have questions about how the process works and whether mammograms hurt. But you may also have some really basic questions about what this lifesaving procedure involves and what it does, exactly. At a basic level, a mammogram is a procedure that takes an X-ray of your breast, according to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Doctors use a mammogram to look for early signs of breast cancer. And new guidelines suggest that women and those assigned female at birth should start getting screened for breast cancer every other year starting at age 40 (ten years earlier than previously recommended).
    • “The smaller and less advanced cancers we find with screening, the more likely women are able to survive,” says Sonya Bhole, MD, a diagnostic radiologist at Northwestern Medicine. “In addition to saving lives, getting your annual screening mammogram has the power to potentially reduce the severity of treatment that women with breast cancer must undergo,” points out Karla Sepulveda, MD, an associate professor of radiology at Baylor College of Medicine. “Studies have demonstrated that cancers found with screening mammography are more likely to be smaller cancers that have not metastasized, which means they are less likely to need more intensive treatment such as mastectomy or chemotherapy. This also means shorter recovery time and better prognosis.” But despite their lifesaving potential, there is some fear surrounding mammograms, including how they will feel and whether there are any side effects.
  • We hope you tune in to Good Things Utah for this Hot Topic and so much more on a Friday edition of the show.