Enter Your Email Address to Receive a
Copy of MedicExhange Member Demograhpics

Fairfield Memorial Hospital is providing new technology in breast health.

The new digital mammography system will be available for patients beginning October 26. The first two days are already booked full.

This shared mobile mammography unit is the first in the nation to be co-owned by multiple hospitals, a FMH spokesman said. Fairfield Memorial Hospital, Ferrell Hospital at Eldorado, Wabash General Hospital in Mt. Carmel and Lawrence County Hospital in Lawrenceville co-own the unit to provide the latest in women's technology to their local communities.

This mobile unit will be available at Fairfield Memorial Hospital on Monday and Thursday mornings, as well as Wednesday afternoons. One may schedule a digital mammogram by calling the FMH Diagnostic Imaging Department at 618-847-8249.

FMH Digital Mammography is accredited by the American College of Radiology. The accreditation signifies that FMH has met and continues to meet the stringent nationally accepted standards for mammography. The digital mammography system is operated by the FMH technologists who are board certified in mammography. These hospital staff members include Rhonda Grinols, Melanie Perkins, Melinda Courtright and Lezlie McVaigh.

Breast self-examination is still one of the most important tools for early detection; however, regularly scheduled mammograms are highly recommended and can detect a lesion long before it can be felt. This new digital mammography system and the iCAD system will virtually allow no lesion to go undetected.

This innovative system allows screening, diagnosis and biopsy to be performed on a single unit. It also lowers patient radiation dose and increases image quality, especially those women with dense breast tissue. The new digital mammography system will help provide women with the best possible mammogram, reduced exam time, while also reducing (not eliminating) the discomfort often associated with mammography. After the study is complete, it will be analyzed by a SecondLook Digital Computer-Aided Detection technology from iCAD , Inc. Variances in the tissue will be tagged by the iCAD machine, alerting the radiologist that there may be a problem in that area. It's like having two readings of the mammogram.

"Full-field digital mammography has been shown to be more accurate in certain populations of women, and CAD is an important tool that highlights the areas of a mammogram that may warrant closer inspection," said Katherine Bunting, Ph.D., FMH CEO. "By offering digital mammography our hospital further strengthens its commitment to women's health, and it allows us to treat patients with the latest technologies available for diagnosing potential cancers at the earliest possible stage."

SecondLook CAD is designed to assist the radiologist in distinguishing potential cancers from other anomalies in the breast. This advanced imaging technology is extremely proficient in helping the radiologist detect subtle cancers, or those that are most likely to be missed.

CAD technology was recently included in a peer-reviewed study published in the February issue of the American Journal of Roentgenology (Volume 192, Issue 2). The study, titled "Detection of Breast Cancer with Full-Field Digital Mammography and Computer-Aided Detection," found the following:

• CAD with full-field digital mammography showed a high sensitivity in identifying cancers

• The SecondLook CAD correctly marked 94 percent of biopsy-proven cancers

• The sensitivity of iCAD's SecondLook was not dependent on the size of the tumor; it was equally accurate with small and large lesions

SecondLook CAD for digital mammography was designed and developed using thousands of cancer and normal studies, providing powerful digital CAD performance.

Source: FMH

Discuss more about Mammography in our Mammography group