Can we bid a final farewell to the mammogram?
The thermogram is a test using heat radiating from your own body to detect problems in the breast. It involves no contact with the body, no compression, and is completely painless.
A thermogram combines advanced digital technology with ultra-sensitive infrared camera imaging. It doesn’t use radiation, and can be done as frequently as necessary.
Thermograms work by creating infra-red images that are then analyzed to find asymmetries anywhere in the chest and underarm area. Any abnormality that causes change in heat production is seen on a thermogram, so any source of inflammation such as infection, trauma to the breast, and even sunburn will cause abnormality in the thermal picture.
Breast thermography detects patterns of heat generated by the increased circulation produced by abnormal metabolic activity in cancer cells. This activity occurs long before a cancer starts to invade new tissue.
A breast thermogram has the ability to identify a breast abnormality five to ten years before the problem can be found on a mammogram.
Breast thermograms don’t diagnose breast cancer. They simply detect physiological changes in breast tissue that have been shown to correlate with the presence of cancer or pre-cancerous states as do mammograms. Breast cancer is only diagnosed by a microscopic examination of breast tissue. So a thermogram could let you know that you need a biopsy for further tests.
Thermograms are definitely the wave of the future for early breast cancer detection. Amazingly, most traditional physicians don’t know anything about them and continue to recommend mammograms.
related post : Ode to the Mammogram
I’m going though an uncluttering phase and getting rid of a number of books I haven’t really picked up in some years.
At the back of a shelf I found an old favourite from Barbara Seaman, The Doctors’ Case Against the Pill, in which she stated the potentially life-threatening side effects of the birth control pills being offered to women at the time.
Those pills contained very high levels of estrogen — 10 times the amount of hormones necessary to prevent conception, according to Seaman — which could cause such serious complications as heart attacks, strokes and even cancer.
Seaman argued that the pharmaceutical companies and some doctors were aware of these risks, but weren’t informing their patients.
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