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Feelgood Factor ; Health Fitness: Alice Hart-Davis Tries to Set Her Mind at Rest Over a Cancer Scare With Thermascan Breast Screening

Posted on: Tuesday, 3 January 2006, 18:00 CST

By ALICE HART-DAVIS

What is it? A quick (20-minute), noninvasive form of breast screening done with an infrared camera. This takes a thermal image of the breasts which can detect the first signs that a cancer may be forming, up to 10 years before any other procedure can detect it.

What does it claim to do? Detect breast disease at a much earlier stage than is possible with either mammography or self-examination, by recognising subtle changes within breast tissue.

Abnormalities show up as hotspots and the images can detect angiogenesis (the process associated with the growth of a tumour) when the tumour is only the size of a pinhead. To be detected by a mammogram, a tumour must reach the size of a small olive before it will block enough X-rays to create an image on film. Thermal imaging does not claim to be an alternative to mammography, but to offer a different approach to monitoring breast health.

Any science to it? Thermography sounds brand new but the subject has been researched since the 1950s. There are more than 1,000 peer- reviewed studies in medical literature on it and in 1982 the US Food and Drug Administration approved breast thermography as an "adjunctive" diagnostic breast-cancer screening procedure (ie, something to be used alongside other forms of diagnosis).

It is not a failsafe method or an alternative to present methods of cancer detection, but it's a useful additional tool; studies have shown a 61 per cent increase in survival rates when medical infrared thermal imaging is combined with mammography.

Like mammography, thermal imaging is not a diagnostic test (a biopsy is the only definitive test for cancer), but unlike radiographic techniques such as mammography or X-rays, it screens the body without delivering a dose of radiation.

What's it like? I sat facing an infrared camera, removed my top and turned as directed, with my arms above my head, while shots were taken of my breast and chest area from the front, the back and the sides.

The process made me anxious, but only because I've had a lump in my armpit since June. For one reason and another, it took until October to secure an appointment at the local breast-health clinic - which decided it was nothing to worry about - but I was nervous that the thermal image might contradict those findings.

Within minutes, the images were transferred to a computer and turned into colourful graphics which show the relative areas of heat within the tissues; shades of blue are around 30C; yellow is 33C while red indicates 35C. Any red/hot areas within the green and blue breast tissue might mean trouble.

Thankfully, there are none. It's a relief and I'll certainly be repeating this test in future. If anything untoward is developing, I'd rather have the earliest possible warning.

Where to find it? Thermascans cost Pounds 195 at the Chiron Clinic, 121 Harley Street, W1 (020 7224 4622; www.chironclinic.com).

Source: Evening Standard; London (UK)

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