Honest Health
Breast health centers are up in arms.
Breast imaging radiologists are about to lose one third of their patients because a federal advisory panel just said that women, younger than 50, no longer have to appear each year for a screening mammogram.
Oncologists are also going to see a sharp drop in their ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) business. These small, non cancerous, calcified portions of a milk duct, only found through an x-ray, are the predominant diagnosis among 40-to-50-year-old women who have annual screening mammograms.
Considered to be "stage zero cancer" — stage zero means that you don't have cancer — these calcifications are still treated as though they are cancerous, with surgeons performing biopsies, lumpectomies, recommending radiation and estrogen-lowering drugs, and suggesting the idea of single or double mastectomies if patients want to avoid further treatment or eliminate any risks of developing invasive cancers in the future.
Foul ball!
At a national conference on DCIS this past September, experts agreed that we know next to nothing about this condition, except how to find it. The National Breast Cancer Coalition is recommending changing the term DCIS to "atypical hyperplasia," in order to lower the fear factor that now strikes women when are told they have a "ductal carcinoma in situ" or "stage zero breast cancer." It is nice that honesty is about to see the light of day.
Until last week, the U.S. was the only nation in the world that encouraged women during their 40s, without any high risk of developing breast cancer, to go near a mammography machine. Over the years, Canadian and European medical practitioners have watched us in disbelief; now they can at least lower their eyebrows.
Here is an e-mail I received a few weeks ago from Paula, a 50-year-old Manchester resident diagnosed with DCIS after having an annual screening mammogram in 2007.
"You may not remember me but I was one of those women who were at one of your first meetings at the MAC who broke down in tears after having just learned we had breast cancer. ... I went on to research my diagnosis and options.
"It turns out I had a very low grade slow-growing in situ for which I had a lumpectomy. I refused radiation and refused to take tamoxifen — much to the chagrin of my doctors. I am recurrence-free after 2 years and continually fighting all the recommended MRIs (toxic dye solutions) and most of those additional mammograms they keep trying to give me! I am probably one of those over diagnosed and over treated women who are swelling the ranks of 'breast cancer' survivors."
Now that women like Paula will be spared annual screening mammograms in their 40s, the numerous breast health centers that have sprouted on the North Shore in recent years, stand to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual revenues and face significant layoffs as a huge chunk of their youngest clients disappear.
But these clients and others could still be served and this financial loss could be replaced with a new kind of breast health service. As breast health centers downsize their mammography, biopsy and lumpectomy departments, these same centers could begin to offer women real breast health or real breast cancer prevention programs. If women's health is really the goal, then real breast health centers can now educate women on low tech lifestyles that help stop breast cancer before it can start.
For example: real breast health centers could offer blood tests to determine one's vitamin D3 levels and then offer counseling to monitor women as they gradually reach recommended levels of vitamin D3 through using supplements. Vitamin D3 levels of 60ng/ml in blood serum has now been shown to block the first stage of breast cancer development.
Real breast health centers could offer individualized birth control counseling for women over 40, to help them switch off of birth control pills, patches, rings and estrogen based IUDs. Women in their 40's who still use these drugs significantly raise their risk of developing aggressive estrogen negative breast cancers.
Real breast health centers could offer cooking classes for women to learn how to include plant estrogen and other low estrogen foods such as organic fermented soy products in a variety of meals. Fermented organic soy lowers a woman's strong estrogen level and naturally lowers the risk of break cancer.
A fourth idea is to offer programs to educate women about the dangers of putting too much alcohol, nicotine and sugar in our bodies each day. This is obviously not an easy task, but it would take some of the stigma out of treating these dangerous lifestyles and give breast health centers a real challenge. Using one or more of these toxins every day can triple a woman's risk level if she is trying to avoid a second breast cancer diagnosis.
Let's respond to the U.S. Task Force's new guidelines on screening mammograms with a resolve to work harder on stopping breast cancer naturally, before it starts. Let's encourage our north shore medical centers to expand their breast health centers into breast cancer screening and prevention centers; because mammograms do not prevent breast cancer.
Susan Wadia-Ells, a Manchester resident, is a longtime wellness advocate with graduate degrees in politics, energy economics and women's studies. She is the founding director of the national nonprofit organization, Know Breast Cancer, www.knowbreastcancer.net. She also writes the blog www.thetruthaboutbreastcancer.com.
For more: National Institutes of Health State-of-the-Science Conference Statement: Diagnosis and Management of Ductal Carcinoma In Situ (SCIS) Sept. 22-24, 2009. http://consensus.nih.gov/2009/dcisstatement.htm
