Two new reports, one stemming from the American Cancer Society and another published in the New England Journal of Medicine, urge that women at high risk for breast cancer, get regular screenings with sensitive but costly MRI exams. The target population includes women who already have, or have had, cancer in one breast, to reduce chances of it occurring in the other. The NY Times’s Denise Grady reports it on the front page and reports that, with an MRI about ten times the cost of an X-ray, overall costs in the US alone could exceed $1 billion. Plus, she writes in a long piece, if all women in the affected categories were to seek MRI scans, they would overwhelm facilities and the skilled workers who must interpret the results.
The news seems sure to leave many women deeply confused over their wisest course. It also raises questions about health insurors’ ability to pay for a broad new category of routine, expensive screening.
-CP
Other stories:
Boston Globe Scott Allen; LA Times Denise Gellene; Baltimore Sun Frank D. Roylance makes clear that the NEJM and ACS reports are not in perfect agreement; Wash. Post Rob Stein; Reuters Maggie Fox; AP Mike Stobbe; Chi. Tribune Judy Peres; Seattle Times Warren King; Phil. Inquirer Marie McCullough;
Grist for the Mill: NCI Press Release; ACS Press Release;
Related Obituary:
Los Angeles Times Thomas H. Maugh II obit on physicist Paul C. Lauterbur, 2003 Nobelist for his role in development of the MRI technique; Urbana News-Gazette Christine Des Gerennes; St. Louis Post-Dispatch Tina Hesman Saey;
Grist for the Mill: U. Pitt Press Release;
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