Fall in number of women attending breast screenings
The National Breast Screening programme said more than 71% of eligible women attended screenings — in line with the target of 70%. However, it said this data represented a fall-off of approximately 3% from the 2011 figures.
The 858 breast cancers detected represented 6.7 per 1,000 women screened.
BreastCheck said the number of women invited for the first time fell in 2012 and the number of women invited and screened for the second and subsequent time continued to rise.
“This reflects the progression to a mature screening service following the completion of the first round of the national expansion of BreastCheck in 2010,” it said. “This also reflects smaller numbers of younger women [50 to 51 years] entering the programme. For those invited for the first time acceptance rates have fallen to 66.4% and remain outside the target acceptance rate of 70%.”
Majella Byrne, head of the screening service, said: “It is through a regular mammogram every two years that BreastCheck will deliver the most benefit to the population screened and I encourage eligible women to attend each time they are invited.”
Ann O’Doherty, Breast-Check’s lead clinical director, said that since the service began in February 2000, it has provided over 1m mammograms to more than 440,000 women. She said more than 7,100 breast cancers had been detected.
“However, we are concerned that we are starting to see that attendance is falling among women new to the programme, in particular 50- to 54-year-olds,” said Dr O’Doherty.
“We know that many of these women are incredibly busy with many working outside of the home as well as caring for their own families. We would urge every woman to put her own health first and to avail of a free mammogram, when invited, as it could save her life.”
Most (98%) women receive seven days’ notice of an appointment and receive their mammogram results within three weeks (99%). More than 92% of women who were recalled for an assessment appointment after an abnormal mammogram receive that appointment within two weeks.
More than 2,700 women are diagnosed with breast cancer in Ireland each year.
