"Task Force" Bean counters and mammos

iodine/Dotti, I watched the GMA interview this morning.  It wasn't much of an interview, because Robin Roberts didn't have much of a chance to ask questions.  Being a habitual note-taker, I wrote down some of the things Susan Love said.  These are statements Love interjected while trying to refute what Marisa Weiss was saying:

“The newer techniques, digital mammography has not been shown to be any better than the older techniques”

“Mammography has never been shown to work in women in their 40s”

[These new guidelines] “are not depriving young women of their god-given right to be radiated…”

[In response to Dr. Weiss’s suggestion about digital mammograms being better for younger women]:  “Digital mammography is not better in the study”

“Mammography causes as many cancers as it cures”

"We have oversold the notion of early detection…  some cancers that are very aggressive, no matter when you find them, they are still going to be bad.  Others … are slow-growing, and it isn’t going to matter when you find those."

Everyone has a horse in this race -- everyone has an agenda.  Almost all of us on these boards would have been affected in one way or another by these new guidelines.  (I would not have found my own tumor because I would not have been doing self-exams.  The panel says they are of no value.)

I agree completely with your characterization of the panel as a bunch of "bean counters."  What's that old quote from Mark Twain, which he attributed to the wrong source in his autobiograpy?:  "There are three kinds of lies:  Lies, damned lies, and statistics..."

otter 

I am in the group of women under 50 (actually 39 when diagnosed) who mammos were useless for - so were bses.  I was doing both and found a tumor (stage 3) while washing myself in the shower one day (less than a month from last bse) and 4 months from last mammo  BUT I don't think taking away the only detection we have is the answer.  We need to have better detection (and do - MRIs).

I cant tell you how annoyed I get hearing about early detection since I was being watched like a hawk and still ended up with STAGE 3 BC but that doesnt mean I think we should stop trying to detect it for those it does work for!  The truth is that in some women those tests dont work - but in some they do.  I can't believe that it would be recommended to no longer perform these tests without a better option in place.

It sounds like Dr. Love is saying some women are not savable anyway (too aggressive and undecteable, why waste the elecricity to run the mammo,maybe it is her way of  being eco-conscious (I am being sarcastic, I know that is not what she said)

Scary.  I have two teen daughters, this makes me want to throw up.

******This is just my opinion, please don't slam me for it******

That's the way I read it too everyminute -- at least 1200 a year. 12,000 to 15,000 in ten years.  What an atrocity.