Mammograms in 40s

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Breast cancer in younger women is on the rise, insurance will cover it yearly so that’s what I would recommend, as someone whose breast cancer was detected at an early stage on a mammogram.

Same. A mammogram caught my breast cancer at 43. Surgery, radiation, and tamoxifen. No chemo because it was caught early. Get your mammograms!

Also, I was not high risk prior to getting diagnosed. I am BRCA and other gene mutation negative. No real family history. My biggest risk factor was dense breasts, which is extremely common. And being a woman.

[Anonymous]

I’ve been getting them annually, starting at 40 (I’m now 48). It’s worth it to me even though there’s no family history. I guess I’m fortunate that I don’t find them even a little painful, it’s seriously NBD from the pain perspective, and insurance fully covers it, so why wouldn’t I spend half an hour once a year?

[Anonymous]

I am being monitored every six months with mammograms and ultrasounds after an anomaly on a mammo. I can completely see how if I did end up having cancer I would feel grateful for the very close monitoring and early detection. However, in the event that it’s nothing I would be grateful it’s nothing, but meanwhile have been through years of monitoring, with the associated costs (each one is about $1000 out of pocket since they are no longer “screening mammograms”), time, and worry. It’s not clear to me that it’s been a net benefit in my case.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Breast cancer in younger women is on the rise, insurance will cover it yearly so that’s what I would recommend, as someone whose breast cancer was detected at an early stage on a mammogram.

Same. A mammogram caught my breast cancer at 43. Surgery, radiation, and tamoxifen. No chemo because it was caught early. Get your mammograms!

Also, I was not high risk prior to getting diagnosed. I am BRCA and other gene mutation negative. No real family history. My biggest risk factor was dense breasts, which is extremely common. And being a woman.

Exact same situation for me. I am headed to surgery and likely some radiation. No family history and I'm glad for my annual mammograms. I don't think mammograms or even follow up u/s for women with dense breast tissue (that's many of us) is overkill or over prescribing. Obviously, the vast majority of those will show no issue. That's not the right question. It's how many early breast cancers do they catch? Stage 1 breast cancer is 99% survivable, and some types of breast tumors grow very fast, where treatment gets more and more expensive and prognosis goes down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do one every year, when apparently I should be doing a mammo and an ultrasound or MRI, rotated every 6 months, because of my family history.

It's not painful if you schedule your mammo during the first half of your cycle, and you take a Tylenol 30 min before the exam.

Me again. I'm at Kaiser, and I'm in and out in 20 minutes for my annual screening 3D mammos. They're covered by my Kaiser insurance. I have "extremely dense" breast tissue, so with my family history, I will be asking for additional ultrasounds at my next appointment.

[Anonymous]

I was not high risk, athletic, fit, moderate alcohol use, breastfeed years….I had my first mammogram at 41, “dense breasts” ignored the recommendation that comes with it for extra screening as overkill, second mammo a year later, boom. Stage 2 breast cancer. Currently in chemo, after a double mastectomy. I’m so grateful I didn’t delay screening till 50! I might have died first. I want to live a long long life with my family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some medical groups recommend waiting til 45 or 50 if you don’t have risk factors. Most of the physicians I know say we are massively over screening and it isn’t resulting in better outcomes but most women I know who are not physicians are going every year.

How would it not result in better outcomes to find the cancer early on mammogram?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am being monitored every six months with mammograms and ultrasounds after an anomaly on a mammo. I can completely see how if I did end up having cancer I would feel grateful for the very close monitoring and early detection. However, in the event that it’s nothing I would be grateful it’s nothing, but meanwhile have been through years of monitoring, with the associated costs (each one is about $1000 out of pocket since they are no longer “screening mammograms”), time, and worry. It’s not clear to me that it’s been a net benefit in my case.

+1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some medical groups recommend waiting til 45 or 50 if you don’t have risk factors. Most of the physicians I know say we are massively over screening and it isn’t resulting in better outcomes but most women I know who are not physicians are going every year.

How would it not result in better outcomes to find the cancer early on mammogram?

Because screening finds very slow growing cancers more often than aggressive ones. The aggressive ones can still be missed while the slow ones could have waited a few years before treatment (so no difference in outcomes for slow cancers whether you screen very often or merely “regularly” and no difference for aggressive cancers because they are so fast even annual mammos miss them).

[Anonymous]

I’ve been getting them annually since 40 and no regrets. The last 5 years I alternate between mammo and MRI every 9 months (supposed to be every 6 months but I stretch it out). I don’t love the MRIs but mammos are quick and easy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am being monitored every six months with mammograms and ultrasounds after an anomaly on a mammo. I can completely see how if I did end up having cancer I would feel grateful for the very close monitoring and early detection. However, in the event that it’s nothing I would be grateful it’s nothing, but meanwhile have been through years of monitoring, with the associated costs (each one is about $1000 out of pocket since they are no longer “screening mammograms”), time, and worry. It’s not clear to me that it’s been a net benefit in my case.

I just posted that I stretch it to 9 months. Part of that is the out of pocket cost (I have high deductible insurance).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some medical groups recommend waiting til 45 or 50 if you don’t have risk factors. Most of the physicians I know say we are massively over screening and it isn’t resulting in better outcomes but most women I know who are not physicians are going every year.

How would it not result in better outcomes to find the cancer early on mammogram?

The over simplified answer is that slow growing cancers grow so slowly you don’t need to catch them all that early, and the fast growing aggressive cancers tend to kill you regardless of when you catch them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I was in my 40s, there were conflicting recommendations. ACS said yearly at 40, ACOG said yearly at 45, USPSTF said yearly at 50.

I am low-risk and waited to 48 to start. During that time, I was being periodically reminded by FB friends who had caught DCIS or even higher-stage breast cancers via mammograms done early how important it was to do this.

Usually these folks did not share information about their own risk factors, which can be quantified using this tool: https://magview.com/ibis-risk-calculator/ (warning: it's a long intake--quite thorough).

To date, I have not gotten breast cancer, and earlier mammograms would not have impacted any breast cancer I might eventually get. It was a good choice for me.

The risk calculator is based on family history. That's it.

The calculator gives me very high risk - 60% - because I have a sister and a cousin with breast cancer. But they were both low risk, because there was no family history before them (both diagnosed the same year, one with stage 3 at her first mammogram). We have all done the genetic testing now and have no genetic markers, which is common.

I think there are discussions to be had about false positives and additional screening/biopsy because of frequent screening. But the idea you are "low risk" does not mean what people think it does. It just means you don't (yet) know if your relatives have or will have cancer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some medical groups recommend waiting til 45 or 50 if you don’t have risk factors. Most of the physicians I know say we are massively over screening and it isn’t resulting in better outcomes but most women I know who are not physicians are going every year.

How would it not result in better outcomes to find the cancer early on mammogram?

The over simplified answer is that slow growing cancers grow so slowly you don’t need to catch them all that early, and the fast growing aggressive cancers tend to kill you regardless of when you catch them.

Yeah, that last is untrue , so mammo it is!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was not high risk, athletic, fit, moderate alcohol use, breastfeed years….I had my first mammogram at 41, “dense breasts” ignored the recommendation that comes with it for extra screening as overkill, second mammo a year later, boom. Stage 2 breast cancer. Currently in chemo, after a double mastectomy. I’m so grateful I didn’t delay screening till 50! I might have died first. I want to live a long long life with my family.

What is the extea screening? I just had my first one at 40 last month. My results had some verbiage about dense breasts, but I didn't see anything about extra screening and nobody has called me otherwise.