And so it begins.
Actually, I have a friend in the mammography field, and they’re discovering that by irradiating women’s breasts so often, they might actually be *causing* some of the cancer that they’re trying to prevent. She’s been railing against the frequency of the tests for years. Apparently they’ve finally decided to slow down the number of tests in order to study it a bit more. Thank goodness, I say!
I’m not qualified to give an opinion on the validity of the recommendations, but the trouble with ObamaCare is that it raises the question in my mind (and in millions of others, no doubt) of whether this is based on sound medical reasoning, or simply financial considerations.
So much for “preventative medicine” in the context of cost savings.
This may be the most blatant example of Orwellian “double think” yet. For years we’ve heard nothing other than “early detection” and earlier and more frequent testing.
Now, on a dime - the advice is absolutely reversed.
What’s next ?
Smoking as preventative health?
I'm waiting for the other shoe....the one that says "If you want it earlier, you pay for it..unless you're black, hispanic...or a terrorist.
I know of women in their 30’s who have died of breast cancer. I don’t see how this will help prevent that.
This is the set-up for medical care rationing for the serfs that will be forced into govt run treatment centers. We have to accomodate all the illegals that will receive the same care while the politicians will receive the care for the nobles. If we, as taxpayers, sit back and tolerate this tyranny you can bet more is to come.
When breast examines are rationed, women will have their breasts examined by seedy characters in back rooms operating outside the law.
I read the article, and it’s not about saving lives (through reducing the effect of excessive radiation) but it’s about saving MONEY. That’s the bottom line.
The previous recommendation of yearly mammogram was not based on evidence of effectiveness, it was a guess made under conditions of ignorance about the actual effectiveness of mammograms.
When evaluating the sort of recommendation you have to keep in mind that "more" or "more frequently" does not necessarily equal better; to give an extreme example if we recommended weekly mammograms cancers would certainly be detected earlier, but only at the cost of radically increased radiation exposures which would likely substantially raise cancer rates.
So the question is, what is the most effective schedule?
As the evidence is studied, we're starting to base such recommendations on actual studies of effectiveness, and it turns out that the benefit of yearly mammograms are outweighed by some of the costs. And there's nothing surprising about this: if you think about it it's highly unlikely that the 12 month guess made under conditions of ignorance would turn out on the basis of pure blind luck to be ideal.
Such decisions really are cost-benefit decisions, and as more (and more accurate) information becomes available we will probably be hearing many more such "unintuitive" recommendations for changes in diagnostic and treatment procedures.him
The previous recommendation of yearly mammogram was not based on evidence of effectiveness, it was a guess made under conditions of ignorance about the actual effectiveness of mammograms.
When evaluating the sort of recommendation you have to keep in mind that "more" or "more frequently" does not necessarily equal better; to give an extreme example if we recommended weekly mammograms cancers would certainly be detected earlier, but only at the cost of radically increased radiation exposures which would likely substantially raise cancer rates.
So the question is, what is the most effective schedule?
As the evidence is studied, we're starting to base such recommendations on actual studies of effectiveness, and it turns out that the benefit of yearly mammograms are outweighed by some of the costs. And there's nothing surprising about this: if you think about it it's highly unlikely that the 12 month guess made under conditions of ignorance would turn out on the basis of pure blind luck to be ideal.
Such decisions really are cost-benefit decisions, and as more (and more accurate) information becomes available we will probably be hearing many more such "unintuitive" recommendations for changes in diagnostic and treatment procedures.him