Value of Mammograms Over Age 70 Questioned

Mammograms can help detect breast cancer. But these screening tests did not reduce the number of advanced breast cancer cases diagnosed in older women. So says a study in the Netherlands. The study looked at the effect of extending regular screenings to women between the ages of 70 and 75. It included more than 25,000 women in this age group. All had been diagnosed with breast cancer between 1995 and 2011. While early stage breast cancer cases rose quite a bit in these women over those 16 years, advanced breast cancer cases did not show marked improvement. Researchers expected that, with increased detection of early breast cancer, advanced breast cancer diagnosis would significantly decrease. It did not. Regular mammograms in this older age group could do more harm than good, the researchers said.