A technique for reducing mammogram pain is strictly superficial

Where Does it Hurt?

When you get a mammogram, where does it hurt?

I’ve never had a mammogram (and never will), but I know the answer to that question: It hurts the breast – the ENTIRE breast – inside and out.

That’s why a new technique designed to reduce mammogram pain is little more than a feeble attempt to convince women that a mammogram is a terrific idea.

Mashed in the machine

While researching today’s e-Alert, I came across “Ode to a Mammogram.” Here’s an excerpt (no author listed):

My skin was stretched and stretched,
From way up under my chin.
My poor b**b was being squashed,
To Swedish pancake thin.

Excruciating pain I felt,
Within it’s vice-like grip.
A prisoner in this vicious thing,
My poor defenseless t*t!

“Take a deep breath,” she said to me,
Who does she think she’s kidding?
My chest is mashed in her machine,
And woozy I am getting.

Stretched, squashed, vicious, mashed – any woman who’s had a mammogram knows just how well those words apply. What many women don’t know is how much harm the procedure might inflict.

More on harm in a moment. First let’s look at a study that tested lidocaine – a topical analgesic gel.

Researchers at Idaho’s St. Luke’s Mountain States Tumor Institute recruited more than 400 women who said they expected a high level of discomfort during their mammogram. Split into four groups, the women received one of four interventions: pre-procedure ibuprofen, acetaminophen, lidocaine gel applied to the breasts, or a topical or an oral placebo.

Questionnaires completed after the exams showed “discomfort was significantly lower in the lidocaine gel group.” But results also revealed this: “There were significant differences in discomfort between different combinations of technologists and machines.”

In other words: Use whatever painkiller you like – if the technologist brings the compression plate down too far, your breasts will be hurt because the skin surface is by no means the only place where pain is felt when a breast is squashed to Swedish pancake thin.

Refreshing common sense

A HealthDay News report about the St. Luke’s study offered a surprising voice of reason from Dr. Julia Smith, director of the New York University Breast Cancer Screening and Prevention Program.

Dr. Smith made three important points:

• Women in the lidocaine group reported significantly less discomfort but didn’t report significantly higher satisfaction
• The gel might interfere with image quality and affect the accuracy of the mammogram
• Women shouldn’t have to undergo this kind of pain

Dr. Smith added, “We should have an improvement in technology.” And I couldn’t agree more.

Yearly mammograms expose women to doses of radiation that, over time, may actually prompt cancer growth in those with a family history of cancer. And as I’ve mentioned in previous e-Alerts, it’s pure madness to subject breasts to the extreme compression required in a mammogram because rough handling of breasts can cause existing tumors to spread.

Many conventional doctors send their patients to conventional radiologists for a mammogram without ever informing them that alternative procedures (requiring no compression or radiation) are available. You can read about several of these safe and effective breast imaging techniques in the e-Alert “and 4” (8/6/03).

I hope you’ll share this e-Alert with your women friends to help us get the word out that mammography is not the best choice for breast imaging and breast cancer prevention.

Sources:
“Premedication to Reduce Discomfort during Screening Mammography” Radiology, Published online before print, 7/22/08, radiology.rsnajnls.org
“Lidocaine Gel May Ease Mammography Discomfort” Serena Gordon, HealthDay News, 7/22/08, healthday.com