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ALSO SEE:
BREAST PAIN & PATHOLOGY
 Breast Thermography
Thermographic Breast Health Assessment
We all know someone who has
or has had breast cancer. In fact you probably know several
women with breast cancer. Breast cancer is on the rise. In the 1970's approximately 1 in
11 women developed breast cancer, today it is 1 in 8 and approaching
1 in 7. Our clinic has seen several women in their early 30's
with breast cancer. Being diagnosed with breast cancer in your
early 30's indicates the cancer was present when you were in your
20's. I feel strongly we can be
proactive in reducing the incidence of breast cancer and I am proud
to offer breast thermography and proactive treatments, lifestyle and
nutritional guidance to increase your chances of living your life
free of breast cancer. There are no guarantees that even if
you do take all the correct steps in decreasing your risk you won't
develop cancer, but natural medicine inclusive of Chinese herbal
medicine, hormone balancing, lifestyle and nutritional
considerations will offer you the opportunity to reduce your risk
rather then simply wait and hope you won't develop breast cancer.
If you are healthy, an specifically if your breast tissue is
healthy, simple lifestyle changes and proper nutrition will go a
long way to reducing your risk. Did you know many, if
not most people are deficient in vitamin D and this deficiency
increases your chance of developing breast cancer? The correct
dose is controversial and depends on various factors, but adequate
dosing is essential. If your breast tissue is unhealthy (do
you experience significant breast tenderness, have fibrocystic
breasts, fibroadenoma or other benign pathology; does your breast
thermogram indicate an unhealthy state, then your breasts are not
healthy) then appropriate treatment using Chinese herbal medicine,
hormone balancing and other methods will go a long way to resolving
the pathology and reducing your breast cancer risk. I
encourage you to be Proactive rather than Reactive.
If you have questions about
what can be done to help you improve your breast health, I encourage
you come in for a free consultation, or make an appointment to get
started now.
Breast Thermography Use is on the Rise.
Check out the following news cast for more information.
www.iact-org.org/news/news.htm 
MAMMOGRAPHY
Mammography is the standard of care for detecting breast cancer,
but it has serious limitations. In younger women (under 50)
mammography can miss up to 40 percent of cancers. In older women
mammography can miss up to 20 percent. What this means is, when you
receive a mammogram and clinical breast exam and are told you are
fine, come back next year, all is not necessarily fine.
Consider the following quotes.
"Regular mammography of younger women increases their cancer
risks. Analysis of controlled trials over the last decade has
shown consistent increases in breast cancer mortality within a
few years of commencing screening. This confirms evidence of the
high sensitivity of the premenopausal breast, and on cumulative
carcinogenic effects of radiation." The Politics Of Cancer by
Samuel S Epstein MD
“You can only stick your head in the sand for so long, I
think mammograms will be a forgotten technology before long.”
Cornelia Baines, a public health researcher at the University of
Toronto.
Reported in JNCI (Journal of the National Cancer Institute),
researchers looked retrospectively at almost 4,000 women in the
US between the ages of 40 and 69. The study found that women who
underwent screening mammography died at the same rate as women
who declined a mammogram.
An honest assessment of the value of mammography must include
other opinions such as.
"The largest study ever done to evaluate the impact of
routine mammography on survival has concluded that routine
mammograms do significantly reduce deaths from breast cancer."
Dr Isadore Rosenfeld's Breakthrough Health By Isadore Rosenfeld
MD
Although I am not a fan of mammography, I want to point out that
I am not attempting to sway you from using this technology, I am
only pointing out that it is controversial and is likely not as
reliable as you may have been lead to believe. This is where
breast thermography comes in. Thermography is another way of
evaluating breast health. Not only is thermography useful in
cancer screening, the technology can provide us with information
about the health of the breast even in the absence of cancer.
This allows you to be proactive in maintaining breast health.
What about Breast Self Exam?
Breast Self Exam (BSE) has been taught as a method of early cancer detection. It is a fact that
most breast cancers are found on BSE, but according to two very
large studies, there is no increase in survival in these women. The
problem is simple. By the time a cancer is large enough to be felt
it has usually been there many years and is found too late to impact
survival rates.
So it is clear a better approach to locating breast cancers is
needed and better preventive care is a must. I have discussed
better preventive care in the Women's Health section of the web site
and I have mentioned specifics in previous editions of my women's
health newsletter. (If you would like to receive our free
newsletter just send an
email.)
Breast MRI is the up and coming technology that is more reliable
than mammography. But a recent study revealed that even though
breast MRI located more tumors than mammography, the MRI missed some
tumors the mammogram located.
The solution, at least part of the solution, is thermographic
imaging. Thermography evaluates physiology rather than anatomy. What this means is a thermogram will see the
evidence of a tumor rather than the tumor itself. Many years before
a tumor is large enough to be seen with mammography, its presence
can often be seen with thermography. Research indicates this may be
up to a decade before it can be seen with mammography, MRI, etc. What would this mean to your health? If you knew a breast
pathology, and potentially a premalignant condition existed, would
you take steps to improve your breast health?
Thermography, although used by some women as their primary breast
health screening tool, should be used in conjunction with anatomical
imaging. Thermography is a very useful tool but its not 100 percent
accurate, no screening method is.
Breast thermography services are currently available in our
Palmer office and once monthly in Anchorage at the Alaska
Alternative Medicine Clinic run by Dr. Sandra Denton, MD.
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