Constant Breast Cancer Checks Lead To More Benign Biopsies
Tuesday, April 1, 2014 - 23:10
in Health & Medicine
The Sun newspaper in the UK has a "check 'em Tuesday" campaign - a weekly call for women to examine their breasts. Readers are even asked to send in photos to prove compliance and can even sign up for a text message reminder. It sounds like concern for readers and it is, except it doesn't help and may even hurt, according to Glasgow general practitioner Margaret McCartney in BMJ. McCartney argues that teaching women to examine their breasts regularly "has been shown not to reduce deaths from breast cancer and actually increases the chances of a benign biopsy result." She says it is "unfair to tell women that regular self examination will save their lives when it may simply incur anxiety and have the potential to harm." read more