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The New Digital Mammography Unit
Each year, an estimated 28,600 Canadian women will be diagnosed with breast cancer. What’s more, 5,500 will die of the disease.
These facts are as simple as they are startling, and they show precisely why we at the Yarmouth Hospital Foundation are so committed to the fight against breast cancer. As part of this commitment, we are happy to announce that all funds raised from our 2025 Christmas Appeal will go directly towards the $750,000 cost of a new digital mammography unit. Used in diagnostic imaging, this key piece of technology allows healthcare professionals to screen for and diagnosis cancer and other diseases of the breast.
As Dr. Michelle Ong (Site Lead for Diagnostic Imaging, Yarmouth Regional Hospital) told us, “The demand for breast imaging has grown steadily in the last few years. Women are more proactive in monitoring their health, and physicians are recommending assessments and more frequently referring women who are facing uncertainty about breast lumps or other breast issues. Our existing mammography unit has served our patients well but is outdated technology.
Dr. Michelle Ong
The new unit gives improved patient comfort and overall faster machine speed to acquire mammograms. It also offers new advances in imaging, such as tomosynthesis, contrast-enhanced mammography, and vacuum assisted biopsies. Tomosynthesis is helpful for evaluation of dense breast tissue and has been improved to keep radiation dose low, similar to regular mammograms. Contrast enhanced mammography is more tolerable to patients than MRI breast biopsies. Vacuum assisted biopsies will increase the accuracy of the area targeted and reduce the procedure time.
Our end goal is to provide every woman, our mothers, sisters, daughters and friends, the best standard of care — early cancer detection, more efficient and improved accuracy in cancer detection.”
Join us and help bring this new digital mammography unit to our hospital!
