New State Law Helps With Early Breast Cancer Detection

Back on November 1st, Oklahoma passed legislation requiring healthcare providers to give notice to some women who may have an increased risk of breast cancer.  

House Bill 2601 says doctors must include breast density information in all mammography reports to help patients like Cindy Thompson.

Doctors told Cindy Thompson that she has dense breast tissue and that makes it harder to detect a breast lump. So two months ago, Cindy underwent a full breast ultrasound, a more thorough exam for women with dense breasts. 

"My dad just died of colon cancer and mom has breast cancer so I think that early detection is key," said Cindy Thompson.  

Breast surgeon Dr. John Frame is the only place in eastern Oklahoma using the ABUS, Automated Breast Ultrasound Study.

"Once this machine is place on the breast it has a much larger footprint here that will scan the breast automatically and then collate all of the info that's gathered and a wonderful little computer software program puts all of that information together and recreates a 3-d image of the breast.
That 3D image is looking through the entire breast tissue that in concert with the mammogram, I can be more sure that I'm seeing all of the breast tissue and what may be hidden that may be hidden by the dense tissue in the mammogram," said Dr. John Frame.

If something is found, the image can help pinpoint the problems and he can be hyper focused on the area with the hope of early detection.

"So the value of this machine is that it can look through if you will, that dense breast tissue and give us better reliability, better exact reading on what's going on in that breast," said Dr. John Frame.

Dr. Frame has had the ABUS for about a year and has performed 400-500 scans. He says they found 3 breast cancers that would not have been detected until the lump was much bigger.