Think Pinker

According to ABC this latest report seems rather alarming. It seems according to a team of Danish medical researchers women are not being told just what type of risk is associated with breast cancer screening.

It seems what is occurring is that women are getting false positive readings and this is causing both extreme psychological stress and the risks associated with undergoing a procedure.

How many false positives seems to be highly debated but it runs anywhere from 1% to 30%. Now 1% might seem rather trivial but 30% is huge and the problem is that women are not being informed about this

It seems that these false positives have a major impact on ones emotional well being – having a diagnosis of cancer is very scary so it’s not surprising that people get really upset. And then to find out it was just a false alarm – well it wouldn’t be surprising to find these same individuals getting angry. That’s quite the emotional roller coaster.

The emotional trauma is bad enough but then you must consider the physical trauma where the body undergoes an unnecessary procedures and while it’s always better to be safe than ignore an unconfirmed positive diagnosis.

Of course no doctor is saying that you should not have a mammogram and they certainly aren’t saying that you should just ignore a positive test result. Rather, the message here is simple – take one day at a time, and don’t panic. Wait until you have had your biopsy or further testing and don’t automatically jump to the conclusion that you have breast cancer or that you are not going to survive.

Survival rates continue to climb and more women than ever are beating the odds. Besides you may not even have breast cancer…