[ad_1]
For years, physicians were alarmed by Marin County’s breast cancer rate, considered among the highest in the nation.
But after peaking in 2001, it began a steep descent, and Marin now equals the state average with breast cancer deaths plummeting 65 percent since 1988.
That’s the good news.
The bad news, says Marin General Hospital’s Dr. Natalya Lvoff, is the recent confusion about what age to start getting mammograms and how often to get them. Once unified in their recommendations, various cancer organizations now offer conflicting opinions. Some now approve a later start for mammograms ranging from age 45-50 instead of the 40.
But Lvoff, a radiologist who is the medical director of the hospital’s Breast Health Center, urges mammograms beginning at the traditional age 40, and yearly screening instead of every two years.
“This is the most important message for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. The No. 1 way to decrease mortality from breast cancer is yearly screening,” she said.
Lvoff points to a National Cancer Institute study showing the United States breast cancer death rate decreased more than 30 percent since mammograms became widespread in the 1980s.
“Before mammograms, the death rate had been unchanged. No screening test is perfect, but screening mammography is the best test we have to detect breast cancer early when it is most treatable,” she said.
Women with high risk factors also may benefit from a breast MRI and possibly genetic testing, she said. Risk factors include a family history of the disease, early menarche (before 11), late menopause (after 55), age of 30 or older at first childbirth, never having given birth, use of hormone replacement therapy, obesity, chest wall radiation, frequent alcohol consumption and smoking.
Ironically, the main risk factor for breast cancer is simply being a woman – and especially one over age 40. “Seventy-five percent of women have no other identifiable factors and 85 percent have no family history of the disease. Screening only women with risk factors will miss the majority of breast cancer,” Lvoff said.
Free risk assessments are offered to Breast Health Center patients. The center, which opened a year ago at Drake’s Landing, offers a three-dimensional mammogram screening called tomosynthesis. It allows the radiologist to see around overlapping structures, and reportedly finds 40 percent more invasive cancers and reduces the need for follow-up mammograms by up to 40 percent.
More comfortable tests that allow the patient to monitor their own level of compression may be on the horizon, Lvoff said.
When it comes to Marin’s past as a breast cancer hot spot, the high use of hormone therapy to ease menopause symptoms is likely the biggest culprit, she said. Women are far less likely to use it now that they know its link to breast cancer.
“Women of Marin are highly educated. They are often the first to read the latest studies and hear the latest news. There is great awareness about breast cancer in Marin County, but there is always room for improvement,” Lvoff said.
Orthodontist promotes Invisalign for children
Longtime orthodontist Jasmine Gorton is in Amsterdam at the moment speaking to international orthodontists about using Invisalign on children.
The new option of using the clear, removable aligners for children as young as 7 may not mean no braces later, but for many, it means no more dreaded expanders.
“It’s revolutionary,” said Gorton of Gorton & Schmohl Orthodontics in Larkspur. “You don’t have the pain of the separators pushing the teeth apart…You don’t have the taste of the sour glue that glues in the metal expander. You don’t have the effect on speech and swallowing when you have something covering the roof of your mouth. You don’t have the unexpected appointments if a wire pokes, and you don’t have the restrictions of not eating hard or sticky foods like carrots. And it’s something that a kid can just pop in or out to clean,” she said.
Clear aligners were made available for adults in 1999 and for teens in 2008. They were just made available for children in July, although Gorton’s office was using them for years before they officially launched.
Her office is among fewer than five orthodontic offices in the Bay Area — and 54 in the world — that offer the aligners for kids, she said.
Children need expanders or aligners when they have impacted teeth or severe dental crowding, which would require pulling teeth later if left unaddressed, she said. An airway problem is also “an automatic ticket” for early treatment although most often an expander needs to be used, she said.
A word of comfort to parents whose only thought is, “What? Johnny might need orthodontics at age 7? Cha-ching!”: Take heart. Only 20 percent of kids flagged by dentists for early treatment, actually end up needing it that young.
New mural at Larkspur bagel spot
A mural of iconic Marin sites now graces the wall of Wise Sons Jewish Delicatessen in Larkspur.
The mural was done by San Francisco artist Amos Goldbaum, who takes complex photos of areas and turns then into modern line drawings.
The mural at the Marin Country Mart location includes Mount Tam, the Greenbrae houseboats, the Civic Center and the Larkspur ferry carrying a boat-load of bagels.
Goldbaum’s murals appear around San Francisco and in five other Wise Sons locations. The company also hired him to paint a mural at its Tokyo location to help create an atmosphere like its stores in San Francisco, Wise Sons owner Evan Bloom said.
Source link
