From the July 2014 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine
Since New York’s enactment, most states drafting legislation have followed suit either using the same/similar language or by going one-step further and reporting a woman’s specific breast tissue category (one of four categories: fatty, scattered, heterogeneously dense, or extremely dense).
The opportunity for informed patient discussion about density, personal risk and supplemental screening may depend on where the patient lives and what she has or hasn’t been told. Taking a look again at New Jersey’s notification law, which became effective on May 1, 2014, it’s easy to see that it is neither specific to the patient nor specific to only those with dense tissue. The law requires all women be notified that they “may” have dense breasts (including women who do not). Though members of both the New Jersey advocacy and radiological communities have voiced their concerns to state legislators that this one-size-fits-all language provides no direct notification to women who actually have dense breasts, as yet, no amendment has been introduced.
Right now, just over half (58 percent) of American women live in states with varying degrees of breast density notification- and the rest live in states with no such requirement. All U.S. women deserve the same opportunity for an informed conversation about breast density. In 2010, efforts on the federal level for an amendment to the reporting requirement of the FDA’s Mammography Quality Standards Act were initiated. Though there has been some progress on federal regulatory and legislative fronts, four years and 19 states later, there is still no national standard.
While each state law furthers breast density awareness, a single national reporting standard is needed to address the growing inequity created by the patchwork of state initiatives.
Author info: JoAnn Pushkin is a two-time breast cancer survivor and breast density inform advocate, author and speaker. She is co-founder of D.E.N.S.E. (Density Education National Survivors’ Effort) and of D.E.N.S.E. NY.
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