Is it politically motivated?

I agree with you Anne.  This is very much politically motivated and it is an example of what will happen if the government gets what they want to with health insurance.  After all this "Task Force" is a government agency which recommends the standards for health care.

Of course it's politically motivated.  National Health Care's first DAGGER, aimed at (mostly) women.   The numbers of us are huge, and this would put an incredible burdon on the system. The way it is all coming together is:   If one has NHC, you will not be able to get a mamo now until you're 50.  If you or your doctor feel a lump, screw you. Wait till you're 50. IF YOU MAKE IT THAT LONG. Because now they are saying feeling a lump means absolutely nothing!  I felt a lump 2 years before my dx.  My doctor IGNORED IT.  I have Advanced Metastatic disease. If it was dx sooner....?  If you have your own insurance, because of NHC guidlines, the insurance you are paying for will probably not be required to pay for this service and probably not be required to pay for treatment, if you went outside the guidlines.  If your doctor goes outside the "guidelines"  he will be fined.  ANYONE  too old, or a burdon on the system, will be left for dead.  (this is how it is in other countries with NHC - Michael Moore, in his movie, only talks to relative healthy people, and the younger adults. It was extremely misleading!)   I've been against this since day one.  But I can't believe how fast it is happening.  Our daughters are in jeapordy.   WE ARE MOVING BACKWARDS NOW!   This will not "derail" health care reform.  This will line governments pockets & insurance companies with MORE of OUR money.

LittleC,  I live in Canada.  Had my first mammogram at age 37, based on doc's recommendations and a family history.  In Canada, if your doctor recommends a mammo, you get a mammo.  And no, he/she is not fined for doing so. 

Why are any of you thinking that the administration has had anything to do with this independent taskforce's recommendations?  I don't agree with them, but it seems to me that the only industry which would benefit from the "adoption" of these guidelines would be the health insurance industry. Do we see more "claim denials" coming up???

lindasa - at this time, it would appear that the only industry to benefit from these guidelines is the insurance industry.  however, if we have a government controlled healthcare system, then it will eventually be the government who benefits by not paying for mammograms.

I agree Linda.  The health insurance industry will take full advantage of this IF you do not get health care reform.

 Believe me, our Canadian gov't has very little to do with our medical choices while American insurance companies have complete control over American health choices.  

I tend to believe that if this is politically motivated the most likely instigator is the insurance companies.  It would make little sense for the gov't to make a move like this at this time when they know what the reaction would be. 

I strongly urge all of us on the "right" and "left" of the healthcare reform debate to unite on this issue!  These new guidelines are unacceptable, period exclamation point!

I share the same suspicion with Anne/ADK -- were these guidelines released now in order to scuttle healthcare reform?  But I understand the fears that these guidelines are representative of what will happen with healthcare reform.

I am trying to find where I read yesterday that these studies were completed and the manuscripts submitted for publication nearly a year ago.  But I do know that the process of being accepted for publication in Annals of Internal Medicine is a long one...

The members of the task force were appointed well before the current administration...

One of the authors/task force members, George Isham, MD, MS is Chief Health Officer and Plan Medical Director of HealthPartners, an HMO in Minnesota.  I googled his political contributions, and found he donated $1000 in 2006 to AHIP-PAC (America's Health Insurance Plans Political Action Committee) -- and here's what I found about AHIP-PAC:

"This association includes 1,300 health insurance companies that provide coverage for over 200 million Americans, according to company information. Members include America's largest insurers: Aetna, the Blue Cross Blue Shield chapters, Humana, UnitedHealth Group, WellPoint and others...  The private insurance companies don't want interference from the government in their market, and AHIP will not support a government-sponsored insurance option."
(http://undertheinfluence.nationaljournal.com/2009/08/ahip-all-for-reforms-but-not-c.php)

Interesting that the published guidelines say "no potential conflicts of interest were disclosed" by the authors. (http://www.annals.org/content/151/10/716.full)

I guess being the head of an HMO and supporting a health insurance industry PAC poses no potential conflict with issuing guidelines...

This recommendation is financially driven

The proposed new guidelines are based on research that looks at the effect of breast cancer screening on society from a public health perspective. This means the researchers were looking at how changing breast cancer screening guidelines would affect the overall public, rather than individual women. In proposing the changes, the task force members said that starting mammograms later in life and doing mammograms less often would save a large amount of money. It also means that about 3% more women would die from breast cancer each year. The task force members felt that the amount of money saved (from fewer mammograms and side effects of extra biopsies and treatment) was greater than the value of more lives saved (3% fewer women surviving breast cancer).

 http://community.breastcancer.org/forum/110/topic/744039?page=1#idx_6

If you go to the USPSTF website "About the Task Force" link, you will note that the Task Force does not list one Oncologist or Breast Cancer Surgeon as a member of the panel. The list looks like a Who's Who of ivory tower acadamicians appointed by a government that seems to think they know your body better than you.

http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/uspstf09/breastcancer/brcanrs.htm#clinical

How can these "doctors" casually condemn the "3% of women who will not survive breast cancer" in the name of saving money based on this recommendation? How can they recommend doctors not educate women on self exam techniques? My God! This is a barbaric move against women.

I come down on the side of those that think it works AGAINST health care reform.  The last thing health care reformers want to see right now is something that gives the appearance of health care rationing.  If it were motivated by them it would have been held up until after the vote. 

Absolutely, SherriG...  we totally need to unite on this issue.

(Please, please understand that when I point out that these guidelines came from some nitwit panel whose members were appointed 1 to 4 years prior to January 2009, I'm only trying to keep this from being portrayed as a political football !  This is life and death for all of us!  I think a united opposition to these guidelines from across the political spectrum will be very powerful !)

All I know is that when I sit in my chemo chair at Moffitt Cancer Center, I'm always the oldest one there. I am surrounded by chemo sisters in their 30's and 40's. Vibrant woman, professionals, mothers of young children. Early detection through mammograms and self exams has afforded them early treatment and CURES!

This recommendation by USPSTF is outrageous! Oh that we could take all the surgically removed breast tissue and nodes of just the women in the past year, ages 30-50 and dump it in a pile on the USPSTF's conference table! They need a visual representing young women who have suffered this horrible disease. Then let them justify their regressive recommendation!

The timing is definitely unfortunate, but I don't think it is politically motivated. It was done by a large group of independent scientests around the country and just happened to be released now.  Most of us on this discussion board probably will not be directly affected due to our being "high risk" (and our daughters will be considered "high risk" due to our history with bc). The ones I feel badly for are those considered to be of "average risk", because now insurance companies will probably give them a very hard time about getting mammos. But perhaps there will be a silver lining to all this. At some point, they may finally realize that MRIs are better overall for detecting bc in younger women (due to greater breast density which makes mammos difficult to read accurately), and that they don't involve radiation! (now, we somehow have to figure out how to make MRIs cost a lot less!)

Anne

And Marie mentioned that the insurers will benefit--but will they?  If my DCIS hadn't been found for another 7-10 years under these guildelines, I would have needed costly chemo and rad treatments. More follow up care visits.  Wouldn't that cost insurers much more than the Tamoxifen tablets I took after my m'gram and biopsy?