BMJ  2003;327:868 (11 October), doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7419.868-b

Letter

Women need better information on routine mammography

Understanding of principles of screening must be improved

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—I read the paper by Thornton et al and the reply by Patnick (see next letter) with interest.1 2 Both the NHS breast screening programme and cervical screening programme have made great efforts to improve the understanding by women of the principles of screening since Anderson and I wrote a paper in 1999 that was critical of the information given.3 Unfortunately there is clearly someway to go.

Patients remain confused. The BBC, quoting from a report by the Cancer Research UK psychosocial oncology group at the University of Sussex, says that patients were flummoxed by terms used to describe screening procedures for breast and bowel cancer and that more than half of the study group either did not know or showed partial understanding of breast cancer screening techniques such as mammography.4

Disappointingly, the leaflet to which Patnick refers (Breast screening the facts) omits to mention the potential . . . [Full text of this article]

John Nottingham, consultant histopathologist

Northampton General Hospital, Northampton NN1 5BD jfnottingham@doctors.org.uk


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Relevant Article

Women need better information about routine mammography
Hazel Thornton, Adrian Edwards, and Michael Baum
BMJ 2003 327: 101-103. [Extract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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