© Damian Dovarganes/Associated PressNearly 75 percent of American women 40 and over say they had a mammogram in the past year.
One of the largest and most meticulous studies of mammography ever done, involving 90,000 women and lasting a quarter-century, has added powerful new doubts about the value of the screening test for women of any age.
It found that the death rates from breast cancer and from all causes were the same in women who got mammograms and those who did not. And the screening had harms: One in five cancers found with mammography and treated was not a threat to the woman's health and did not need treatment such as chemotherapy, surgery or radiation.
The study, published Tuesday in
The British Medical Journal, is one of the few rigorous evaluations of mammograms conducted in the modern era of more effective breast cancer treatments. It randomly assigned Canadian women to have regular mammograms and breast exams by trained nurses or to have breast exams alone.
Researchers sought to determine whether there was any advantage to finding breast cancers when they were too small to feel. The answer is no, the researchers report.
The study seems likely to lead to an even deeper polarization between those who believe that regular mammography saves lives, including many breast cancer patients and advocates for them, and a growing number of researchers who say the evidence is lacking or, at the very least, murky.
"It will make women uncomfortable, and they should be uncomfortable," said Dr. Russell P. Harris, a screening expert and professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, who was not involved in the study. "The decision to have a mammogram should not be a slam dunk."
Comment: The AMA's attempt to demonize intergrative medicine may have to do with the following fact: Many Americans turning to alternative medicine. Read more about this ongoing battle:
Brutal Attacks on Integrative Medicine Practitioners: Is the Federation of State Medical Boards Behind This?
Woman Warned: Alternative Health Techniques are Illegal Practice of Medicine
Can My Doctor Get Into Big Legal Trouble by Offering Natural Health Treatments?
Doctors Use Natural Remedies (But Don't Prescribe Them)
Homeopathy: Modern Medicine's First Target:
The Swiss Government's Exceedingly Positive Report on Homeopathic Medicine
What Science And History May Owe To Homeopathic Medicine