H. Winter Griffith, M.D.
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 Talk to your doctor about the need for follow-up medical examinations or laboratory studies to check liver function, mammogram.
Skin & sunlight:
No problems expected.
Driving, piloting or hazardous work:
No problems expected.
Discontinuing:
Don't discontinue without consulting doctor. Menstrual periods may be absent for 2 to 3 months after discontinuation.
Others:
• May alter blood sugar levels in diabetic persons.
• Advise any doctor or dentist whom you consult that you take this medicine.
• May interfere with the accuracy of some medical tests. |
Janet Zand, LAc, OMD, Allan N. Spreed, MD, CNC, James B. LaValle, RPh, ND
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 Some physicians recommend that all women have a mammogram at around age forty that can be used as a baseline; should any problems be suspected at a later date, this will enable your doctor to compare an early mammogram with a later one and make a more informed diagnosis. There is controversy, however, about whether there is really any benefit for most women in starting mammo-graphic screening before age fifty. |
John Robbins
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 Since then, he has developed a harmless and inexpensive skin test using the body's own antigens that can detect the presence of cancer cells up to six years before they would show up on a mammogram (and without exposure to harmful X-rays), 90 percent of the time.55 As of 1994, 1,200 people had taken the test, and there had been no false positives, no times that the test said cancer was present when it actually wasn't. Mammograms, on the other hand, are notorious for high rates of false positives, leading to a tremendous amount of anxiety and unnecessary medical intervention. |
Elson M. Haas, M.D.
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 Since I had not seen a doctor in two years, I found an internist who prescribed a battery of tests, including my blood, urine, a mammogram, an ultrasound, and a bone density test. The last revealed some osteoporosis while the rest of my tests turned out fairly normal. Then I went to a gastro-enterologist who did scopes and biopsies, which revealed celiac sprue (an inability to tolerate wheat and other gluten grains). It was suggested that I follow a gluten-free eating plan for the rest of my life, avoiding all wheat products, as well as rye, barley, and oats. |
Isadore Rosenfeld, M.D.
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 Another mammogram, a sonogram, or a simple needle aspiration may be all that is necessary. "Atypical cells" in the screening biopsy are not often harbingers of malignancy, but if that's what the report reads, you should be reexamined by your doctor every four months, and have a mammogram at least once a year. Don't hide your anxiety. Discuss the implications of your breast findings with your doctor, and be sure you understand them. |
Arthur C. Upton, M.D.
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| Modern equipment produces a high-quality mammogram at a dose as low as 0.1 rad (see p. 577 for definition of rad). A mammogram delivering 0.2 rad given to 100,000 women at age forty-five might lead to the loss of about one life from radiation-induced cancer, but between twenty and fifty lives would be saved in this group from early detection of breast cancer.
The number of mammography units in the United States increased from 184 in 1982 to 10,000 in 1990, not all of which operate at the lowest possible dose or are of optimal quality. |
The Life Extension Editorial Staff
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 Instead of an initial needle biopsy, most women with a palpable mass begin follow-up tests with a mammogram and/or ultrasound of the mass. This imaging can help some women avoid a needle biopsy by identifying a mass as a simple cyst, complex cyst, or a suspicious mass that could be cancer.
For Women Under Age 30
In this age group, the follow-up pathway is slightly different because most of these women with a palpable mass have a very low rate of breast cancer. |
Ralph W. Moss, Ph.D.
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 Upscale Memorial Sloan-Kettering has fielded a posh, designer-decorated mammogram van, undercutting independent operators by offering examinations for only $60 instead of the usual $125 or $200 paid in a hospital or a doctor's office. A Wall Street health-care analyst commented:
Ancillary care is where the bucks are, it's that simple. Expensive hightech services like magnetic resonance imaging, mammogram vans, and various types of chemotherapy are not only highly profitable, but for a big cancer center like Memorial, they help breed a kind of consumer loyalty. |
The Life Extension Editorial Staff
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| Sclerosing adenosis may produce lumps and appears on a mammogram as a calcification (a small deposit of calcium) in breast tissue.
Intraductal Papillomas
Small, wart-like, benign growths that project into the breast ducts near the nipple ate intraductal papillomas (National Cancer Institute 2001b). They usually occur singly, but can also appear as multiple lesions. The smaller nodules are difficult to palpate. The primary sign of intraductal papilloma is nipple discharge, either clear or bloody. Breast pain and tenderness may occur. |
| Breast Self-Exam
A breast self-exam provides an opportunity to detect tumors that may develop in the time between an annual mammogram and a clinical breast exam. To increase a woman's chances of detecting a small tumor at a time when it may be more responsive to treatment, a breast self-exam should be performed monthly, usually 2-3 days after menstruation. For women with irregular periods, it is important to remember to petform a monthly exam on the same day each month. Keep in mind that prior to menstruation or duting ptegnancy breasts may be somewhat lumpy or more tendet than usual. |
National Women's Health Network
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 Taking hormones also makes mammograms more difficult to read so that HRT users are more likely to get false mammogram readings and miss the diagnosis of breast cancer in its earliest, most treatable stage.
The Bottom Line
To us, the bottom line is clear. Some health care providers who have not done their homework are pressuring women to take hormones up to five years before menopause on the theory that hormones support bone health, a notion unsupported by scientific fact. |
Richard P. Brown, M.D., and Patricia L. Gerbarg, M.D.
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 All went well for a year, until a follow-up mammogram revealed cancer in Renee's remaining breast. Naturally, she became upset and depressed. She couldn't imagine going through another mastectomy. Dick doubled her dose of Rhodiola rosea, which sustained her mood and energy through the second surgery and course of chemotherapy. She continues to take the herb and now is fully engaged in her work and personal life.
Unfortunately, very few oncologists—or medical doctors in general—know about Rhodiola rosea. |
Dr. Gary Null
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 Sixty-five percent of women who do not perform self-exams think a yearly mammogram or breast exam by a doctor is enough.
"Women Uncertain about Mammograms and Breast Health," Cancer Biotechnology Weekly {July 3, 1995): 4.
BREAST SURGERY
Breast-conserving surgery is just as effective as modified radical mastectomy for T1 breast cancers. However, a review of the Colorado Central Cancer Registry records over 5 years shows that 72 percent of T1 breast cancer patients in Colorado chose modified radical mastectomies. The reason appears to be surgeon bias.
B. Tarbox et al. |
The Life Extension Editorial Staff
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| In older women's breasts, density dissipates with age, leaving breasts that ate composed mostly of fat. A mammogram that shows the light gtay patch of a tumot ot lesion sutrounded by the dark gray image of fat tissue is most easily recognized.
Cysts and fibroadenomas appear as circular or oval patches with stark outet edges on x-rays, allowing a radiologist to identify where the border of the benign abnotmal tissue ends and the sunounding normal tissue begins. |
Martin L. Cross
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 They were given 150 mammogram plates, but were told nothing about the patient's medical history. Among the 150 mammograms were twenty-seven proven cases of cancer. Could the radiologists spot the malignancies?
Not particularly well, it turned out.
First, there wasn't much agreement among the ten radiologists. A report published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that only in one case in fourteen did all the radiologists agree about what they saw. |
Jane M. Orient, M.D.
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 Others will refuse to spend $85 for a mammogram but not think twice about the same expenditure at the beauty parlor. Some will be glad to have the mammogram if they don't have to pay for it, though others will avoid it out of fear.
Why I Don't Even Try to Calculate What Other Doctors Should Make
I never worry about surgeons making too much money. I do worry that soon they might not be making enough. An alarming number of my most trusted surgical consultants are thinking of early retirement. It is not just the money, but the money does have something to do with it. |
The Life Extension Editorial Staff
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| Microcalcifications are small, tight clusters of tiny calcifications in the ducts that can be seen on a mammogram and may indicate a precancerous or cancerous condition.
Cysts
Cysts are sacs filled with fluid; they are almost always benign. Although most are too small to feel, approximately a third of women between the ages of 35-50 have cysts in their breasts. If large enough, cysts may feel like lumps in the breast. Normally, cysts are left alone. However, if a cyst becomes painful, it can be aspitated or drained of its fluid. |
Jane M. Orient, M.D.
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| If the mammogram is positive, she may have bought twenty years of life for her $85. If it's negative (as most are), she has bought some reassurance. Is it worth it? In a free market, each patient would have to answer that question for herself.
Cost-benefit questions today are not generally asked that way. Rather, the government asks: 'is it worth it to society to spend society's money to buy every woman a mammogram?"
If so, it is not because mammography is a great money saver. |
Mark Hyman, M.D.
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 See a breast specialist every year and have an annual mammogram d. Reduce fat in your diet
Answer:
Yes! Broccoli (a), and other members of the brassica family, such as cauliflower, brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, and bok choy, are important in that they provide an excellent means of preventing breast cancer by assisting your body in the processing and elimination of harmful hormonal or toxic substances.
Unfortunately, there is no good evidence that monthly breast self-exams (b) actually reduce mortality from breast cancer. |
Tanya Harter Pierce
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 She had undergone a mammogram just a couple of months before, and, strangely, it had showed her to be fine. But with the lump clearly observable now, she was given an ultrasound. The ultrasound showed that Nan most definitely had a tumor, and a needle biopsy came up with the diagnosis of "lobular infiltrating carcinoma."
Nan's doctor immediately recommended a mastectomy followed by chemotherapy. Nan had seen too many other people die after going through chemo for cancer, and she had also seen her own husband recover without it. So, she refused all surgery and chemotherapy. |
Dr. Gary Null
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| Sixty-five percent of women who do not perform self-exams think a yearly mammogram or breast exam by a doctor is enough.
"Women Uncertain about Mammograms and Breast Health," Cancer Biotechnology Weekly (July 3, 1995): 4.
BREAST SURGERY
Breast-conserving surgery is just as effective as modified radical mastectomy for T1 breast cancers. However, a review of the Colorado Central Cancer Registry records over 5 years shows that 72 percent of T1 breast cancer patients in Colorado chose modified radical mastectomies. The reason appears to be surgeon bias.
B. Tarbox et al. |
The Life Extension Editorial Staff
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| TYPES OF STANDARD SCREENING TECHNIQUES
In order to detect breast cancer at its earliest, most treatable stage, the importance of regular monthly breast self-exams, a yearly mammogram, and clinical breast exams cannot be overemphasized. Having regular breast-cancer screening exams is the single most effective way to lower the risk of dying from breast cancer.
"Early-stage" invasive cancer is considered very treatable because the tumor is relatively small and the cancer cells have not spread to the lymph nodes. |
Larry Trivieri, Jr.
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 No rays of any kind enter the patient's body; there is no pain or compressing of the breasts as in a mammogram. While mammography tends to lose effectiveness with dense breast tissue, thermography is not dependent upon tissue densities.
Dr. Hoekstra points to the errors, false negatives, and radiation exposure dangers of mammograms. "Mammography is not an acceptable way of screening breasts; the only reason it's tolerated is that it is a major source of steady income tor radiologists," Dr. Hoekstra says. "They have come to covet mammography and want no competition from other approaches. |
| Current research within conventional medicine provides strong reasons why mammogram screening for detection of breast cancer ought to be reconsidered.
Mammograms Add to Cancer Risk—Mammography exposes the breast to damaging ionizing radiation. John W. Gofman, M.D., Ph.D., an authority on the health effects of ionizing radiation, spent 30 years studying the effects of low-dose radiation on humans. He estimates that 75% of breast cancer could be prevented by avoiding or minimizing exposure to the ionizing radiation from mammography, X rays, and other medical sources. |
Ronald Klatz and Robert Goldman
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 And forty percent of women over 50 have never had a mammogram!
• This year there will be more than 175,000 new cases of breast cancer in the United States, 42,000 of these cases will be fatal.
• If a malignancy is present in a woman over 50, mammography has a 90 percent chance of finding it.
• Women who undergo regular mammography are more likely to be diagnosed early, when the chances of being cured are higher and less radical treatment options are available. |
| And if you are 50 or older, its a good idea to have a mammogram every year.
It is important to realize that breast cancer should not be categorized by age. It does strike women under the age of 40, some cases even occurring in women in their twenties. Therefore, if you have a history of breast cancer in your family or have any suspicious lumps, do not rule out mammography as a protective measure. The dose of radiation needed to get a clear image of the breast today is one-fourth as high as it was 10 years ago. |
Robert Hass, M.S.
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 When she returned to her doctor for an annual breast evaluation, a mammogram revealed that cancer had returned in her left breast. Evelyn's mastectomy had left her with chronic, unremitting pain that she attributes to the fact that her doctor had removed so much muscle tissue. Coincidentally, her husband, Morton, had been diagnosed with kidney cancer and had been treated with an experimental drug, interferon. When the drug failed to halt the spread of cancer, he sought an alternative treatment offered by a New York City cancer specialist,
Nicholas Gonzalez, M.D. Since Dr. |
Janet Zand, LAc, OMD, Allan N. Spreed, MD, CNC, James B. LaValle, RPh, ND
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| Most tumors are found by women themselves rather than by doctors during a medical exam. A mammogram (breast x-ray) can also detect possible cancerous growths, sometimes before there is any mass that can be felt from the outside. If you divide the breast into four equal parts (as you would divide a pie into quarters), the upper outer quadrant, or section, of the breast is by far where the most cancers occur, although no area of the breast is immune.
There are different subtypes of breast cancer, classified by the type of tissue they arise in and their tendency to spread. |
Gary Null, Ph.D.
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 It may take twenty years for enough tumor cells to show up on an X-ray or mammogram. At the time of the diagnosis, you're at the end stage of a healing crisis, not the beginning. Your arteries could be 90 percent occluded before you find symptoms of angina or some other condition. It might take forty years for an occlusion to get that bad. You're told it was caught early, when, in actuality, you got it at the end. So, we've got another 100 million people walking around who are processing disease that is not yet diagnosed. |
Samuel S. Epstein, M.D.
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 Five radiologists have served as ACS presidents, and in its every move, the ACS reflects the interests of the major manufacturers of mammogram machines and film, including Siemens, DuPont, General Electric, Eastman Kodak, and Piker. In fact, if every woman were to follow ACS and NCI mammography guidelines, the annual revenue to health care facilities would be a staggering $5 billion, including at least $2.5 billion for premenopausal women. |
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