Diagnostic Imaging Director Kelly Denton, right, and her staff prepare to see patients at a recent Community Health Fair. The center will have staff on hand again this year to help people at the Health Fair scheduled for Oct. 5. Courtesy photo

ROBERT PIERCE

   • Leader & Times

 

October will be here soon, and so too will be Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Oct. 5 is also the date for Southwest Medical Center’s 15th annual Community Health Fair at the Seward County Activity Center, and as in past years, clinical breast exams will be given at one of the booths.

SWMC Diagnostic Imaging Director Kelly Denton explained what will take place as part of the exams.

“They will actually palpate the breasts to feel for lumps and talk to the attendees about preventative care and when they should start mammograms, how often they should have them,” she said.

Denton said a great number of women do not get the preventative care they need.

“We’re seeing that right now,” she said. “I’ve had a number of biopsies recently that have come in, and they haven’t had their annual mammograms in three or four years or longer.”

Denton said some cancers are further along than they likely would have been had preventative care been done earlier such as checking for lumps and doing mammograms. She emphasized mammograms will not be done at the Health Fair, but visitors to the booth will hear about getting mammograms and get a reminder to get a yearly mammogram.

Denton was unsure of how many times an early mammogram helped save a life, but she said this is the purpose of screening mammograms.

“We’ve done promotions with businesses in town where we worked to get their patients in,” she said. “We’ve had a 40-year-old with zero symptoms come in for her baseline, very first mammogram, and we found cancer. It was at the earliest stages. Usually in that aspect, you can have surgery to remove it and some good followup afterwards, and sometimes, you don’t have to have the radiation and the chemo when we find it at those early stages.”

Denton said there are many types of breast cancer.

“There are cancers that are only seen in mammograms,” she said. “There are cancers that are more often seen in ultrasound, and there are some cancers that are not seen in either and are more seen under MRI.”

For this reason, Denton emphasized the importance of knowing what is going on with the body.

“If you feel lumps, make sure you’re talking to your provider,” she said. “If ultrasound and mammography are showing nothing and you have dense breasts, maybe we need to move to an MRI. That’s a discussion to have with your doctor to make sure we’re following all of the avenues to find any signs of early disease.”

Denton said early detection starts with mammography.

“That’s the first thing we look for,” she said. “If you’re feeling something, if there’s changes in the breast that aren’t normal, whether there’s dimpling of the skin, whether it’s a newly inverted nipple, that’s stuff that needs to be investigated because there’s changes. That’s when we start with mammography, move into ultrasound, MRI is needed, and biopsy is needed.”

At the Health Fair, Denton said patients will primarily information and clinical breast exams.

“Patients should have a clinical breast exam, meaning their provider, nurse practitioner or doctor should be doing a physical exam of their breasts every year,” she said.

Those who get tested for breast cancer at the Health Fair will get immediate results.

“They will talk to them, tell them if they feel anything,” Denton said. “If they do find something, they will write an order to have a mammogram and an ultrasound worked up. I take those orders, bring them back to the hospital, and we start calling those patients to get them scheduled on Monday morning.”

Denton added if nothing is found, but a patient still wants to schedule a screening mammogram for later, all they need to do is call Diagnostic Imaging.

“If you’re not having any symptoms, no lumps, we are a self-referral facility, meaning they can call themselves and schedule a screening mammogram,” she said. “The only thing we require is the name of a provider for the report.”

Denton too reminded everyone chances for breast cancer increase with age.

“When people say, ‘I didn’t think I needed this anymore. I’m older,’ that’s not the truth,” she said. “It’s more important for you because the older you get, the more likely your chances are. So far this year, we have already done 41 biopsies at Southwest Medical Center, and we found 16 cancers. Last year, we found 20 cancers, and in 2022, we found 31 cancers.”

Denton clarified the people in those numbers had screenings, had a finding, were brought back, and either a cancer was found, or later problems were discussed.

“Some of the most recent, we’re finding are further along in their disease process,” she said. “Had they been getting routine checkups, I can only think about what could’ve happened, but maybe, we could’ve found these earlier, and they wouldn’t have to go through everything they went through.”

The Community Health Fair is scheduled for 7 a.m. to noon Oct. 5 at the Activity Center.

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