10 Reasons you should screen for breast and cervical cancer
Screening for cancer can save your life before you ever show signs of a problem. Regular screenings can catch breast and cervical cancers early, when they’re small, have not spread, and are easier to treat. With cervical screening, these tests can even prevent cancer from taking hold in the first place. There are 2,233,995 women in Kentucky who are at risk of developing breast or cervical cancer. And if that is not reason enough to schedule a screening, here are ten more:
1. Screening is easy, and for some, even free. Call 1-844-249-0708 to schedule an appointment for a screening through Kentucky’s Women’s Cancer Screen Program. You can also find out if you qualify for free testing.
2. Your risk changes as you age. The older women get, the more their risk increases to develop breast or cervical cancer with fatal results. In fact, the mortality rate rises from 10 percent for women under age 40, to 36 percent for women over age 65. The American Cancer Society recommends starting your mammograms as early as your early 40s, and making sure to screen as often as every year when you reach your 50s.
3. Early detection saves lives. Doctors widely agree that early detection tests for breast cancer helps save thousands of lives a year, and many more lives could be saved if more women and their health care providers pursued these tests on a consistent and regular basis, according to the American Cancer Society.
4. Early treatment is more effective. If breast cancer is detected in stage 1, which means the cancer remains localized and in its earliest stage of development, there’s a 100 percent survival rate over a five-year period. However, the survival rate plummets to 22 percent when the cancer is detected at stage 4. Regular mammograms can often help find breast cancer at an early stage, several years before physical symptoms ever develop, and when treatment is most successful.
5. Early detection of breast cancer may mean less invasive treatment. Unsurprisingly, many decades of research shows that women who have mammograms regularly are more likely to find breast cancer early when it’s smaller and still confined to the breast. In cases like these, women are less likely to need aggressive treatment like chemotherapy or a mastectomy (surgery to remove their breasts), and more likely to recover into a healthy, normal life. Some of the most important indicators of a woman’s chances of overcoming the disease in the end are the size of a breast cancer and how far it has spread.
6. The same goes for cervical cancer. The most invasive kinds of cervical cancer are found in women who have not had regular screenings, reports the American Cancer Society.
7. Black women face the highest mortality rate for cervical cancer since they wait to get screened.Of black women 40 and under who have been screened for cervical cancer, 33 percent have already reached the late stage, and of those 65 and older, 80 percent have reached the late stage. Of white women 40 and under, 38 percent are in the late stage, and of those 65 and older, 68 percent are in the late stage.
8. Early detection is working. If detected early, cervical cancer is one of the most successfully treatable cancers. In the US, the cervical cancer deaths have plummeted by more than 50 percent over the last 50 years due to the effectiveness of Pap test screening, which is the main way doctors first find signs of cervical cancer.
9. Cervical cancer can be stopped before it starts. You can find, treat, and stop cervical cancer before it even starts by detecting precancers through a combo punch of Pap and HPV (human papilloma virus) testing. The screening can actually prevent most cervical cancers from ever taking hold by detecting abnormal cervix cell changes (precancers), which can be treated before they develop into a cervical cancer. The screenings offer the best chance to find cervical cancer at an early stage, when successful treatment is likely.
10. Even if you’ve received HPV vaccination, you’re still at risk. Even if you have been treated with the HPV vaccine — HPV can lead to cervical cancer — it doesn’t protect against all of the types of HPV that can cause cervical cancer. It’s very important that you continue to have cervical cancer screening even after you’ve been vaccinated.