Don’t wait. Know when to get a mammogram to protect yourself from breast cancer

One in eight women in the U.S. will battle breast cancer at some point in her life, according to the American Cancer Society. But a diagnosis doesn’t have to be a death sentence.

“The earlier that we can diagnose the breast cancer, the better chance we have of curing the breast cancer,” said Dr. Christopher Minette, director of mammography at Coliseum Medical Centers.

Minette suggests that women start annual breast exams with a gynecologist or their regular physician in their late teens, along with monthly self breast exams. Yearly mammogram screenings should begin at age 40, he said.

“The exceptions to that are women who have a strong family history of breast cancer, particularly those with a mother, sister, grandmother, that was diagnosed before the age of 50,” Minette said. “Those women, we will start screening 10 years before. So, if a mother had breast cancer at 42, we’ll start screening them at age 32.”

Minette also refers those patients to genetics counselors, who can look for DNA abnormalities that might increase the risk of breast cancer.

“It allows us to identify those at-risk individuals and implement earlier screening, preventative strategies — whether it be preventative surgeries or giving them the opportunity with what we call chemo prevention, which means giving them medicines that might help them reduce their risk of developing certain cancers,” said Danielle Rogers, genetic nurse navigator for Coliseum Health System.

Minette recommends patients notify their physician if they notice a palpable new lump, skin changes or nipple discharge, especially if it’s bloody.

He emphasized the importance of regular breast screenings, even for women without a family history of cancer.

“It’s very disheartening when we have a woman who comes in that has had mammograms annually and then she’ll skip a couple years and she’ll come in and she’ll have a mass that we probably could have picked up, you know, a year or two beforehand,” he said. “Mammograms can detect cancers that you can’t feel or you can’t see.”

Samantha Max is a Report for America corps member and reports for The Telegraph with support from the News/CoLab at Arizona State University. Follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/smax1996 and on Twitter @samanthaellimax. Learn more about Report for America at www.reportforamerica.org.

This story was originally published October 2, 2018 at 3:04 PM.