Has anyone decided not to go for a routine mammogram?

[hattie43]

I'm curious to know . I have mine next week and will attend but last time was a nightmare as I was recalled and health anxiety went through the roof . Luckily no cancer . I was reading that about 30% of women don't attend Apparently mammograms don't pick up everything and aren't foolproof , but surely they are better than nothing .

So not only did my surgeons lie but also Breast cancer now, McMillan, cancer research, American literature, world health organisation .....across the cancer you get different grades of cancer so you could be grade 3 in one place and grade 4 in another but you're still grade 4. Each of the 4 types of breast cancer vary in aggression and the risks and chances of survival as well as the typical chances of survival with or without treatment......which bit is a lie?

Probably going to put a link up to a special herbal supplement

@IceFair thats a little unfair. The op asked for reasons why people would opt to not have screening - which people have answered. No one has spread misinformation as it’s information given freely on the uk government website and on the nhs website for mammograms and in the leaflet that is sent with the appointment letter. Unless I’ve missed a post which says BC can be cured by drinking urine.
No one is trying to put people off either - they are just giving their experiences and reasons as asked. Not everyone will experience the same thing regarding interactions with staff, feeling of pain or lack of, or anything else.

Well I'm not going to do that, because I am medically trained.

Yes, cancers are graded. No that doesn't mean that it's dead easy for someone with grade one cancer to say "that's fine, I'll leave it" and nor does that mean that grade one cancer will not kill you. HTH.

You'll find anyone medically trained will see there are risks and benefits to screening, and that shaming or frightening people into screening for anything is poor.

I go. Every time. Because it’s not about me, my ‘rights’, ‘my choice’, my ‘I know more than you’.

it’s about my family, my girls I fought to bring into the world. My husband I’ve already scared the shit out of by having a heart attack. I don’t care how many needless biopsies/scans/mammo I have (I’m good at growing cysts) if it detects a cancer early enough to intervene and prevent it spreading (unfortunately they can’t tell which ones will or won’t, thus the ‘over treatment’ - I call it better safe than sorry) I will keep going.

smears look for changes, not frank cancer, changes indicating it’s a possibility.

Are mammos painful? Yeah, a bit. Briefly. Lots of investigations are painful. We have nerves. They transmit pain.

and as for the appt was made and it wasn’t convenient, ffs grow up. Just call the number and move it.

I assume all of you refusing the screening will also be refusing the investigations and treatment (which will make a mammo like swimming in the sunshine) as advanced cancer could have been prevented but you decided to not buy into it?

The cancer that can't be identified as a danger or not is DCIS Ductal Carcinoma in Situ if your told that is what you have you talk it through think about it and decide but if your told it's one of the others it's much more straight forward....but you can't be told unless you know it's there and what it is. If I had DCIS I may well decide to wait TNeg no way would I risk it.

Had my first mammogram this morning. Prepared myself for the worst, thinking that it might be quite uncomfortable. It was actually totally fine, not uncomfortable at all, and I actually quite enjoyed it.

Did I say dead easy, did I say grade ? Did I say anybody tells you what to do? Did I say anyone could say it will or won't kill you? God they can't even tell you what side effects you will get from your tailored chemo. Of course there are risks and benefits but are you honestly as an NHS medically trained BC specialist saying it's safe to ignore hereditary BC or because a minority find something painful it's safer to pretend you will find a lump 100% of the time. Are you saying if you are TNeg your safer to ignore it?

I assume all of you refusing the screening will also be refusing the investigations and treatment (which will make a mammo like swimming in the sunshine).

You assume correctly, that I wouldn’t accept any treatment. @Bunnyfuller
I can’t say for others on this thread.

I would like to know where these rude healthcare professionals who work at breast screening clinics are.

I have had several mammograms at our local breast screening clinic in Barnsley, and the staff have been nothing but polite and respectful.

It's awful isn't it I vividly remember changing my round dad (mum mum never saw him naked in their 50 year marriage) and hoisting him naked from his bed to strip the bed and wash him no humiliation for him having his four children doing that I'm sure some think you peacefully pass in your sleep no pain.

@RampantIvy my rude staff were on the phone and were whatever service provided the telephone system for Northamptonshire breast screening service four years ago.

Can you put the links up please I can only find info on 2 studies talking about one type of BC, DCIS that comes way down the list

Have you had a baby?

This is very encouraging. Thank you.

I have so far avoided having a mammogram. The idea of having my breasts squeezed between metal plates that someone else is in control of is nightmare material. Many years ago I heard an account of torture on Woman's Hour and it haunted me for ages afterwards. Silly I know. Any mention of breast abuse makes me feel sick.

I haven't gone for a smear test for many years (mainly because it was so hard to get an appointment at GPs) and I opened my bowel screening test kit when it arrived a few months ago but there's no way I want to be catching and scooping up my own faeces. Nope!

Isn't that the normal NHS appointment booking line? Who deal with people moaning about why my appointment has a 2 year wait list etc. And all the verbal abuse. They are not the ones with your boobs in their hands either way.

Can I ask why I'm just curious?

It wasn't metal plates it was a plastic clear screen for me today. Apparently some ladies with small breasts find it more painful. My nurse was lovely, quick, gentle. She shimmy me into position, lifted my chest into place, made me put my arm up, chin up, bottom out, breathe in. 4 times, left front then right front, then left and right side. Then I was done. Completely painless. I know it isn't painless for all, but I wasn't looking forward to it (hate smears) but found it fine.

No it wasn’t. And I didn’t say they were the ones with my boobs in their hands - that I could not care less about, as I have no qualms in that area. my post nearer the beginning of the thread details what they said and how they handled my polite and efficient request to cancel and remove my name from the mammogram screening program.

I did refuse one a few years back - I has recently had an ultrasound scan to check out a vsmall lump and that came back as ok.
My reason for refusing was down to the letter that came with the mammogram invite, which to me indicated that they were picking up and treating a lot of cancers that would never have caused harm.

I have had a mammogram since then.
Its difficult, I think the screening should be improved if at all possible as the stats quoted in the letter did not sound good to me.

Machine

I am too young for it right now. I worry about being judged for the state of my boobs. They have a lot of very thick keloid scars (from self harm). Many times, I have had un-necessary comments from nurses/HCPs about my scars when I was seeing them for an unrelated reason.

My mum goes for the screening and has no issues at all. My best friend finds it very painful and traumatic. She literally can not sleep for days leading up to her appointment. It is sad that so many women on MN dismiss and invalidate any experiences that do not tally up with their own. It is rife on threads about health screening for women... threads about smear tests always take a nasty turn.

Like I said, I am too young for screening, but I can understand how some women find it annoying to be sent an appointment date and time that they did not ask for. It can feel like a summons.

Have the test if you want, don't have it if you don't want to. Your body, your choice.

@jannier my original post.

Alphabet1spaghetti2 · Today 16:10
I’ve chosen not to have mammograms.

I am older and have seen too many people who have had cancer both survive it and die from it, they all had very unpleasant treatment and were often pushed into treatment they didn’t want and regretted with awful side effects, both at the time and later on.

I would not attend numerous hospital appointment or remember to take long term medication - neither are in my nature, not even if my life depended on it. (I would not go on a transplant list for the same reason) So for me it would be a waste of scarce resources that are better going towards someone who can and wants to benefit from them.

My choice is to live in blissful ignorance of cancer and enjoy my life day to day.

Everyone should have a right to decide for themselves, and that choice should be respected.

I have my annual mammogram tomorrow afternoon. Of course I will be going. It would never cross my mind not to.

I have been having annual mammograms for almost 20 years now. I started in my mid-30s as I'm high risk for breast cancer due to my family history so I'm under the care of the breast clinic at one of the big London teaching hospitals.

There is a LOT of scaremongering and ignorance on this thread. Some of you really need to get a grip. I appreciate that my message won't be well received but I don't really care. My mother died from breast cancer at age 51. She had breast cancer twice and was in remission each time when it came back. Finally the cancer came back as secondary cancer in her liver and stomach and she was dead within 12 days of finding out. She had cancer on and off throughout all my teens and early 20s. We spent a lot of time in hospitals and she suffered greatly. My father and I (I'm an only child) put on brave faces but it devastated us, and when she died it ripped our relationship apart and it took another 2 decades to rebuild it. It changed me forever, in far too many ways to list here. So those of you saying you'll just live with the cancer and you'd rather live in ignorance and what will be will be, think about your loved ones and what impact this might have on them. Think about your children and what it will do to them. I was one of those children and I promise you that you don't want your child to go through what I have been through. My mother fought the cancer with everything she had. She was young when it started and had everything to live for but back then treatment wasn't as advanced as it is now and not many women were breast cancer survivors. She had seen her older sister die a year earlier from breast cancer. I lost my mum and my aunt within a year of each other to the same awful death. It's different these days. Survival chances are much higher. So I ask you to grab the opportunities offered to prevent this cancer from taking you away from your loved ones. If you won't do it for yourself, do it for them.

I am emotional writing this. I will be emotional tomorrow when I go for my mammogram. It brings back deep feelings of loss and pain that I try so hard to bury the rest of the time. I am so grateful to still be here, and I carry some guilt for that. I would give anything to have my mother and my aunt back here with me now. Mother's Day is looming, The anniversary of both deaths are looming. My birthday is looming - my aunt died on my birthday and my mother was told the cancer was back and she was going to die on my birthday. It is a shitty shitty time of year and an especially shitty time to have a mammogram. But I will go. Because I can. And because I must.

So now I try to pull myself together a bit, and say that in almost 20 years of NHS mammograms, no member of staff has ever been rude to me. They have never been anything less than helpful. Occasionally I find the experience a little bit uncomfortable for a few seconds but that's it. Certainly no physical pain (some emotional pain perhaps but...)

@HundredMilesAnHour you make quite an assumption that some of us have families or loved ones.