Understanding Breast Cancer Screening

Screening is perhaps the single most important thing women can do to prevent death or disfiguration from breast cancer. A screening is process which looks for breast cancer before there are any symptoms. The three standard breast cancer screening methods are breast exams performed by women on their own breasts, clinical breast exams performed manually by a doctor during a checkup, and mammograms, which are x-rays of the breast. It is important to do all three types of screening regularly, as recommended by your doctor. All good advice on breast cancer screening will lead you towards early detection of cancer. If you wait for symptoms to show instead of undergoing a screening, you could unknowingly be giving breast cancer a head start. Breast cancers rarely cause symptoms until they are quite large, and/or have spread beyond the breast.