Why Black Women Should Ignore New Mammogram Guidelines

Last week, the government released new mammography guidelines recommending that women should begin mammography screening at 50 years of age instead of the previously recommended age 40. According to a recent Washington Post interview with Kay Dickerson, a director at the Cochran Center for Clinical Trials at Johns Hopkins, "Mammography's benefit in terms of saving lives is very small for women 40-49." Dickerson comes to this conclusion based on the results of a recent clinical trial that found that screenings were not necessary for women younger than 50.

However, it seems that black women are missing from Dickerson's assessment and recommendation. While the incidence of breast cancer is lower in black women than white women, black women have a higher incidence of breast cancer diagnosis before age 45. Additionally, black women with breast cancer have a significantly lower survival rate (75%) than the survival rate of white women (90%).

There have been very few studies done on black women and breast cancer, and quite honestly, the medical field is virtually at a loss on what to do with us. According to a recent study published in the Oncologist, "The incomplete understanding of risk factor exposures in African-American women has resulted in doubts regarding our ability to accurately predict breast cancer risk in this population subset via the established tools utilized for Caucasian-American women."

This means that even though it has been established that black women cancer types, survival and risks differ substantially from those of white women, there is no substantive knowledge or data for black women and breast cancer. This further means that the medical field cannot reasonably predict our needs for mammography, treatments, risks and survival. Due to this, these new mammography guidelines are just ridiculous.

My mother had breast cancer. She went in for a mastectomy two weeks before her 40th birthday. She died the day before her 49th birthday. There is no way my mother could have reasonably relied on these new guidelines and no reasonable African American woman should.

As always, it's up to African American women to be forceful about what we will accept as reasonable healthcare. Mammograms beginning at the age of 50 will not work for our population, and we should not accept these guidelines. Additionally, the medical field needs to get to work at figuring out ways to keep us alive. Having an "incomplete understanding" of any aspect of our health is unacceptable. We have been contributing to the development of this country for over 400 years. We deserve not only reasonable health care, but the best healthcare, and we should demand nothing less.