Baptist Women’s Health Center recently completed an expansion of its Humphreys location, which will enable it to provide services for an additional 8,000 patients a year. The expansion also accommodates the latest technology for early breast cancer detection, contrast-enhanced mammography, which produces more precise images compared to standard mammograms, especially for women with dense breasts. Baptist Women’s Health Center is the first facility in the Mid-South to offer this new technology.
“Breast density is a risk factor for breast cancer, and about half of all women have dense breasts,” said Dr. Lynn Gayden, medical director of Baptist Women’s Health Center. “Contrast-enhanced mammography helps level the field for detecting breast cancer early in all women. This new technology may decrease the number of breast biopsies and follow-up testing required, as well as provide more comfort and reassurance for women with dense breast tissue.”
A contrast-enhanced mammogram can detect cancers that may not be visible on a standard mammogram, generating fewer false positives than MRI breast imaging and making breast tumors easier to see. It involves injecting a contrast dye into the blood before taking two mammogram images. The contrast goes to areas of increased blood flow in the body. Because breast cancers generally have more blood flow, they will often attract the contrast.
Contrast-enhanced mammograms have several additional benefits. The process is faster, less expensive and generally better tolerated than MRI. The mammograms may also provide patients with a definitive answer on the day of their visit compared to possibly waiting days or weeks for MRI results.
Contrast-enhanced mammograms are often recommended for patients with increased risk factors, such as dense breast tissue, because they have a four to six times higher risk of developing breast cancer than women with no dense tissue.
