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USPSTF breast screening guidelines put 100,000 women at risk: Dr. Daniel Kopans

by Lauren Dubinsky, Senior Reporter | April 29, 2015
Women's Health X-Ray

DOTmed News: The ACR claims that the adoption of these draft recommendations will result in thousands of additional and unnecessary breast cancer deaths per year. What do you think about that statement?

DK: Unfortunately, they are correct. Using the CISNET models used by the USPSTF, it has been estimated that if women now in their thirties wait until the age of 50 and are then screened every two years, as many as 100,000 women will die, unnecessarily, whose lives could be saved by annual screening starting at the age of 40.

[Hendrick RE, Helvie MA. USPSTF Guidelines on Screening Mammography Recommendations: Science Ignored. Am. J. Roentgenology 2011; 196: W112 - W116]

DOTmed News: What do you think the recommendations should be?

DK: The data clearly support annual mammography beginning at the age of 40.

DOTmed News: What is your opinion of the USPSTF Transparency and Accountability Act of 2015 recently introduced to the House of Representatives?

DK: I do not know the details, but they are clearly not transparent. They did send out their preliminary assessment to some experts, but they ignored the responses. Panels should be composed of experts and all interactions should be public with a majority and minority report if there is no unanimity.

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