THERE WAS a major increase in the number of women diagnosed with cancer by the BreastCheck screening programme last year.
A new report published yesterday states 672 women who were screened in 2008 were diagnosed with breast cancer compared to 396 the year before.
The increase reflects the programme’s expansion, with more women being screened in the last year. Some 92,061 women were screened last year compared with 66,527 in 2007.
The programme offers breast cancer screening to women aged 50-64 with no symptoms every two years, with the aim of picking up cancers early and thus ensuring better outcomes.
It began in 2000 and has now been rolled out to all regions. The last regions to benefit were the south and west and all women in those regions can expect to have been offered first round screening by the end of next year.
The uptake rate among those offered screening last year was 77.4 per cent, in excess of the programme target of 70 per cent. However, this still means more than 20 per cent of women eligible for and called for screening are not availing of it.
The report says more than 98 per cent of women screened got the results of their mammogram within three weeks. It adds that more than 90 per cent of those who had abnormal mammogram results were offered an appointment at an assessment clinic within two weeks.
However the chief executive of the National Cancer Screening Service, Tony O’Brien, states in the report that in two areas BreastCheck did not achieve target performance parameters during 2008. Targets fell short for the length some women had to wait for hospital admission after being diagnosed with breast cancer and for the timeframe for calling some women to second-round screening. The report says 81.7 per cent of women diagnosed with breast cancer were offered hospital admission within three weeks of their diagnosis, which falls short of the target of 90 per cent.
“While this target was not fully met, it should be acknowledged that over 90 per cent of women were offered a bed within three weeks and five days,” Mr O’Brien said.
Meanwhile, 86.5 per cent of women previously screened were asked back for screening within 27 months, again short of the 90 per cent target. Mr O’Brien said while some screening round slippage occurred, 93 per cent of women were re-invited for screening within 28 months.
The report also states that in the future, following completion of the first round of screening nationally, “the availability of resources will dictate the ability to progress the extension of age range of BreastCheck to women aged 65 to 69”.
Since the BreastCheck programme began, it has provided almost 560,000 mammograms to 276,000 women and detected 3,500 breast cancers.