Why does the United States have Dense Breast “Inform” Laws? What I learned and why it matters

By JoAnn Pushkin

On the same day I detected a lump in my breast and was diagnosed with breast cancer, I learned that the cancer had been obscured on my mammograms an estimated 5 years in a row behind dense tissue. The cancer did not show up on a mammogram the very day it was large enough to feel.  I was never informed that breast density increases the risk of developing breast cancer, never told that breast density can drastically reduce the likelihood that cancer will be detected on a mammogram, and never told that supplemental screening tools were available which might have detected my cancer at an earlier stage. I was shocked to learn that while this information was not shared with me, my breast density was shared by my breast imager with my physician every one of those years. My breast imager knew I had dense breasts, my physician knew I had dense breasts, the only that didn’t know was the one with dense breasts.

JoAnn Pushkin, Executive Director of DenseBreast-info.org

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