Queen of the Valley Medical Center has purchased $1.1 million worth of 3-D medical technology to improve screening for breast cancer.
“It really advances our ability to detect breast cancer,” Queen radiologist Christopher Schultz, M.D. said of the two Hologic 3D Mammography machines.
“This is the most advanced technology for breast cancer screening, and we are blessed to have it here in the Napa Valley,” said Elaine John, president/CEO of Queen of the Valley Foundation.
“Not only are we providing our patients with the best care possible, we are allowing them to be screened close to home, with no need to travel out of the area,” said John.
This technology is the newest addition to the hospital’s breast cancer screening program, which also includes digital 2-D mammography.
The purchase was made possible by grants and community contributions to Queen of the Valley Foundation’s $10 million Cancer Care campaign to bring the latest in cancer prevention, diagnosis and treatment to the Napa Valley.
Breast cancer affects one in every eight women over the course of a lifetime. If breast cancer is found early, the five-year survival rate is almost 100 percent. In 2017, an estimated 252,710 new cases of invasive breast cancer are expected to be diagnosed in women in the United States; more than 50 women were diagnosed with breast disease in Napa County in 2016.
Queen of the Valley has performed more than 400 3-D mammographies since June. The technique can reveal fine details that may otherwise be hidden, said a news release.
The images are converted into a stack of very thin layers, or “slices,” for the radiologist to review.
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“Rather than seeing one flat image of the breast, you are examining the breast tissue layer by layer, like pages in a book,” said Schultz. “That allows us to potentially see a lesion that may be hidden by tissue.”
Conventional 2-D mammograms can be limiting due to overlapping layers of tissue, which can sometimes produce unclear results, false alarms, or worse — cancer being missed, Schultz said.
Using 3-D technology should decrease the number of “call backs” by an estimated 40 percent. Being called back for more scans is stressful, he noted. “This will give greater peace of mind to patients.”
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Schultz estimated that the new technology can find an average of 40 percent more of the kinds of invasive breast cancers “which when found early” are usually curable.
The technology can detect lesions earlier, when they are smaller and when cancerous lesions are at lower “stages,” he said.
For patients, the process is very similar to receiving a routine mammogram. The technologist positions the patient, compresses the breast, and takes images from different angles. The 3-D exam lasts only a few seconds longer per image and uses very low X-ray energy, keeping radiation exposure below FDA guidelines. No additional breast compression is required.
The 3-D scanner has already helped one Queen patient. The woman, who was not identified for privacy reasons, had both a 2-D and 3-D scan at the Queen earlier this summer. The 3-D revealed she has breast cancer, something that was not visible in the 2-D scan taken at the same time.
“It was an eye-opening experience,” Schultz said. “It validated our decision to use this technology.”
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