Hi all, I was called up for my yearly mammogram on Friday, which I went for on the say so of my breast care nurse. I didn’t think I’d still need them since I’m CT’d every 3 months? Thoughts anyone? Reason for asking I suffer dreadfully from scanxiety and now I’m a bundle of nerves again…
To be honest, I have wondered whether they are necessary at all after a primary diagnosis.
For example, my mum had breast cancer 10 years ago and had a mastectomy on one side. She had regular mammograms on the other breast these last 10 years… it always gave great reassurance that they came back clear… but it eventually came back in her bones… no checks on her bones… or even advice what to look out for… ever!!! It seems most women’s secondary diagnosis isn’t often in the breast ?!
Hi Jools,
I’ve been wondering the same thing, as since my secondary diagnosis I still get called for Mammograms. I queried it with the Breast Clinic when I attended the scan and was told to speak to my Oncologist…Oncologist then said something along the lines of “if you’ve been offered one then yes keep going”. I tried to query it with her but she didn’t want to advise me either way (I suspect she’s risk averse given the amount of complaining I’ve done about the service in the past).
I did attend the mammogram I was called for last year after secondary diagnosis but I am thinking I might not bother this year, as I am also getting 3 monthly CT scans currently.
You have enough on your plate without the additional worries of a mammogram. I was given a clear mammogram 6 months before I was found to have two tumours and heavy lymph node involvement. No one mentioned one of the tumours was triple negative. That was 2018. A tiny skin infiltration was my alert. When I questioned the mammogram, I was told it depended on the radiographer but was still the best way of picking up breast cancer.
Now I have SBC, in the past 6 months, two MRIs and a CT scan have failed to pick up my SBC. It was an ophthalmology biopsy that located the cancer. Fair enough, it was tucked inside my eye socket but MRIs should have picked it up instead of referring to an indeterminate mass!! Again I have skin lesions but they haven’t been picked up by the scans. We are working solely by the blood markers to see if treatment is working. I have lost all trust in scans (apart from the bone scans which explained that I had a badly healed fracture of the sternum and the CT scan was looking at scar tissue, not cancer). I’m hoping I’ll be offered a PET scan - something has to be right!
Having had my rant, I will still go for my mammogram if treatment allows. I don’t get scanxiety after all these failures. I just hang onto blood markers!
Hi Jools,
I have secondary breast cancer and have CT scan every 12 weeks. I was surprised to be invited for annual mammogram, but checked with oncologist who advised no longer required.
Maybe check again. One less thing to worry about?
Take care and enjoy the sunshine.
Nicola