The number of women diagnosed with breast cancer has been increasing dramatically in recent years.
As a thermographer I can attest to this as I have personally seen an increase in women with fibrocystic breast, suspicious thermographic findings and breast cancer over the past 2 years.
Aren’t we getting tired of these statics?
One out of eight women is diagnosed with the disease with a staggering 4,000 new cases diagnosed weekly.
Every year in the United States, more than 186,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer and more than 41,000 die because of the disease. With the billions dedicated to cancer research only 1-3% spent in research goes to prevention.
Breast cancer is an industry that focuses on treatment, not prevention.
The rhetoric of the war on breast cancer is just that…rhetoric, women want answers to prevent, treat and gain remission from the grip of breast cancer.
Informed women are aware of the actions they can take to minimize their risk of developing breast cancer like reducing exposure to environmental estrogens and other toxins in their body, including:
eating healthy organic produce,
consuming hormone -free animal products,
using natural skin care products,
maintaining optimal levels of vitamin D,
exercising on a regular basis,
maintaining a healthy weight,
ditching their under-wire bras,
healing sexual trauma and
getting a yearly thermogram to monitor the health of their breasts.
However, there is one secret weapon many women are not aware of: the essential mineral known as iodine.
Iodine helps your hormone receptors function properly, giving your hormones the ability to communicate with ease and allowing your moods to be regulated. The breast tissue also requires iodine to remain healthy.
There is growing evidence linking iodine deficiency and:
breast cancer,
fibrocystic breast,
uterine fibroids,
thyroid nodules,
breast cysts,
pancreatic cancer,
prostate cancer,
thyroid cancer and
lower IQ.
Estrogen production becomes unbalanced and dysfunctional, and breast tissue becomes more sensitive to estrogen. Cystic changes occur, increasing the risk of breast cancer. Iodine turns on cancer cell death, apoptosis.
Dr. Dave Derry, breast health specialist, states “iodine enables the excess cells [in the breasts] to be cleared out, and the breast can return to its natural state as the fibrocystic disease slowly disappears from the breast. A lack of iodine in the body can lead to the development of fibrocystic breasts.” You can read more at www.theiodineproject.webs.com
Results obtained in studies of breast health noted that all forms tested: molecular iodine, sodium iodide and potassium iodide produced beneficial results; the best results were achieved with molecular iodine. Molecular iodine comes from sea vegetables.
Without the proper amount of iodine, breast tissue can become fibrocystic or develop precancerous and cancerous lesions.
Recent research shows prolonged deficiencies of iodine can exacerbate or be a contributing factor in the development of breast cancer. Animal studies conducted over 40 years ago showed breast tissue of animals with iodine deficiency developed cancer when the deficiency was not corrected.
The same study showed the risk of breast cancer was directly related to the length of time the iodine deficiency was present. Iodine deficiency is also known to cause fibrocystic breast disease.
It is a pre-cancerous condition of the breast tissue, which makes your breast very painful and fibrous.
Due to the fibrous and dense nature of breast tissue in a fibrocystic state, it is very difficult for doctors to detect the presence of breast cancer.
Iodine supplementation has been shown to significantly decrease breast pain, tenderness, and nodules of women with fibrocystic breast disease.
Iodine can also decrease uterine fibroids.
Japanese women consume a diet high in iodine-rich seaweed, which provides them with an iodine intake twenty-five times higher than the average American woman.
Japanese women also have breast cancer rates roughly one-third of those found in American women, and that disappears in Japanese women who immigrate to the US, where they consume considerably less seaweed.
If you have Graves Disease, or Hashimotos, please consult your physician before supplementing with iodine.
There are three beneficial forms of iodine to nourish multiple body systems. Three forms are optimal because different tissues in the body prefer different forms.
For example, your thyroid tissue absorbs iodine best as potassium iodide, while breast tissue takes up iodine in the form of molecular iodine. Additionally, there is evidence using sodium iodide enhances absorption of the other forms. Iodine supplementation is not just for preventing goiter.
Actually, only a small amount of iodine is really necessary for preventing goiter. But today, doctors have found that all tissues of the body require iodine.
The breasts, ovaries, uterus, thyroid, brain and prostate tissue require iodine.
This is far from a definitive guide to iodine as there is so much information and science out there on the subject. We need to know of its importance in breast health as well as in all endocrine health. Look for the continuation of iodine in the next blog or grab a copy of by book: Thermography and the Fibrocystic and Dense Breast that provides further information.
When we are educated about our breast health, it is empowering. No one loves her breasts as much as you do, and you want to keep them for the rest of your life!
As the holiday season approaches, a gathering would not be complete without a cheese board. Until I started researching the genetically engineered growth hormone called rBGH, I was a hard core grazer at those cheese boards. Not anymore.
This is not new news, but like news, it is released and falls by the way side. It is urgent that women in particular know the dangers that genetically engineered cheese poses to their breast health.
Please seek out organic milk and cheese at your local farmers market and health food stores. For those wanting to avoid cheese altogether, several vegan cheeses have come on the market. There are options.
Thank you Dr. Mercola for permission to share this message.
By Dr. Mercola
Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. If you’re a woman, your chance of getting breast cancer in your lifetime is about one in eight.
Researchers at a breast cancer conference stated that up to one-third of breast cancers could be avoided by making different lifestyle choices, such as the foods you choose to eat.
There is one food you may be surprised to learn, that is directly linked to breast cancer—and that is pasteurized dairy in the form of milk or milk products.
The risk lies in consuming milk from cows treated with a synthetic, genetically engineered growth hormone called rBGH. Unfortunately, this applies to about one third of the dairy cows in America.
When you consume dairy products from these cows, every product made from their milk is contaminated with this dangerous hormone—be it cheese, ice cream, yogurt, butter—or just plain milk.
Cows are injected with rBGH to boost their milk production.
But science has proven this practice, although profitable to the industry, comes at a high price to you, as well as to dairy cows. RBGH, or recombinant bovine growth hormone, is a synthetic version of natural bovine somatotropin (BST), a hormone produced in cows’ pituitary glands.
Monsanto developed the recombinant version from genetically engineered E. coli bacteria and markets it under the brand name “Posilac.”
RBGH is the largest selling dairy animal drug in America.
But it is banned in Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and in the 27 countries of the European Union because of its dangers to human health. Many have tried to inform the public of the risks of using this hormone in dairy cows, but their attempts have been met with overwhelming opposition by the powerful dairy and pharmaceutical industries, and their government liaisons.
Monsanto Lawyers Threaten “Dire Consequences” for Whistleblowers
In 1997, two Fox-affiliate investigative journalists, Jane Akre and Steve Wilson, attempted to air a program exposing the truth about the dangers of rBGH. Lawyers for Monsanto, a major advertiser with the Florida network, sent letters promising “dire consequences” if the story aired.
After attempts by Fox to bribe the reporters to keep quiet failed, the station agreed to air a revised version of the report. An unheard of 83 edits later, the report was shelved and the courts took over. Although a lower court ruled in favor of the reporters for some $425,000, a Florida appeals court denied them whistleblower protection, claiming Fox (and the media in general) have no obligation to tell the truth and have the freedom to report, essentially, fact OR fiction as real news.
They tell their story in an article at PR Watch. (It was taken down)
It is stories like this that reignite my determination to bring you factual information about these important issues regarding your health.
Despite decades of evidence about the dangers of rBGH, the FDA still maintains it’s safe for human consumption and ignores scientific evidence to the contrary. According to Dr. Samuel Epstein, a well-respected professional in cancer prevention and toxicology and chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition, the FDA has responded to evidence that rBGH is unsafe with a wide range of “tenuous and inconsistent claims” based on “highly speculative and misleading calculations…based on a wide range of assumptions,” often citing flawed scientific studies that simply are not meaningful.
In 1999, the United Nations Safety Agency ruled unanimously not to endorse or set safety standards for rBGH milk, which has effectively resulted in an international ban on U.S. milk. The Cancer Prevention Coalition, trying for years to get the use of rBGH by the dairy industry banned, resubmitted a petition to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, MD, in January 2010.
They are still waiting for a response. Although the FDA stubbornly sticks to its position that milk from rBGH-treated cows is no different than milk from untreated cows, this is just plain false and is not supported by science.
Differences Between rBGH-Treated and Untreated Milk
According to Dr. Epstein, rBGH milk differs from natural milk nutritionally, pharmacologically, immunologically, and hormonally, and he cites the following differences. RBGH milk contains:
Increased levels of insulin growth factor-1 (IGF-1)
Contamination with illegal antibiotics and drugs used to treat mastitis and other rBGH-induced diseases, as well as pus from increased rates of mastitis among the cows injected with rBGH
Increased levels of the thyroid hormone enzyme thyroxin-5′-monodeiodinase
Reduced casein content (a milk protein)
Increased concentration of long-chain fatty acids and decreased concentration of short-chain fatty acids
ALL of the factors above can cause or contribute to health problems for people. But people aren’t the only ones suffering—as it turns out, the cows getting injected with these hormones are suffering as well.
RBGH Causes 16 Different Medical Problems in Dairy Cows
As mentioned above, the cows receiving this synthetic hormone suffer massively high rates of mastitis, a painful infection of their udders. Monsanto’s own data show up to an 80 percent incidence of mastitis in hormone-treated cattle, resulting in the need for routine administration of antibiotics and other drugs. This increases the frequency of allergic reactions and fuels antibiotic resistance. But mastitis is not the only adverse veterinary effect. The Canadian Journal of Veterinary Research (2003) found 16 different harmful medical conditions resulting from rBGH administration to dairy cattle, including:
40 percent increase in infertility
55 percent increased risk for lameness
Shortened lifespan
Hoof disorders
Visibly abnormal milk
From the data presented in this meta-analysis, I think it’s a reasonable conclusion that injecting animals with rBGH is cruel and inhumane treatment, besides producing milk that is not fit for human consumption.
RBGH Raises Levels of IGF-1 in Milk by Up to 70 Percent
IGF-1 is a potent hormone that acts on your pituitary gland to induce powerful metabolic and endocrine effects, including cell growth and replication. Elevated IGF-1 levels are associated with breast and other cancers. When cows are injected with rBGH, their levels of IGF-1 increase up to 20-fold, and this IGF-1 is excreted in the milk.
According to some confidential, unpublished industry studies, IGF-1 levels consistently elevate by 25 to 70 percent in rBGH milk. In reality, it is probably worse than that, since standard calculation techniques used by the dairy industry underestimate IGF-1 levels by a factor of four.
Not only are IGF-1 levels elevated in the milk of rBGH-treated cows, but a significant portion of this IGF-1 is in the free, or unbound, form, which may be about 10 times as potent as the IGF-1 in untreated milk. And not only does pasteurization NOT destroy this protein, but studies show it actually increases IGF-1 levels by about 70 percent, presumably by disrupting protein binding. There is a glaring absence of safety margins for IGF-1 in milk, and assurances by industry and government regulators to establish these parameters have been nothing more than empty promises.
Ok, so the levels of IGF-1 are higher in rBGH milk. But does the IGF get absorbed into your system when you drink it, or does your digestive tract break it down and render it inert?
Science tells us unequivocally that you do NOT break this down when you swallow it, but you DO absorb it into your bloodstream, as evidenced by both human and animal studies. Infants and young children absorb IGF-1 in even higher concentrations than adults, because their gut wall is more permeable to proteins. Infants and young children show higher levels of cow’s milk protein antibodies. The IGF-1 in dairy products appears to be protected during digestion by casein and by dairy’s buffering effects.
How Elevated IGF-1 Levels May Raise Your Breast Cancer Risk
Only one of every 10 breast cancer cases is attributed to genetics—the other nine are triggered by environmental factors, some of which are dietary. The fact that increased IGF-1 levels in hormone-treated milk increase your risk for breast, colon, and prostate cancers as has been documented in about 50 scientific publications over the past three decades. Among them is the 1998 Harvard Nurses Health study, which showed that premenopausal women with elevated IGF-1 levels had up to a seven-fold increase in breast cancer. And women younger than age 35 who have elevated IGF-1 have more aggressive breast cancer.
How does IGF-1 contribute to breast cancer?
IGF-1 regulates cell growth, cell division, and the ability of cancer cells to spread to your distant organs (invasiveness). In other words, IGF-1 has potent mitogenic effects in human breast tissue, especially in the presence of estradiol (a form of estrogen). Growth factors such as IGF-1 are “catalysts” for the transformation of normal breast tissue into breast cancer tissue, and are critically involved in the aberrant growth of human breast cancer cells. The following two findings have direct bearing on this link between elevated IGF-1 levels and breast cancer:
Specific IGF-1 mammary cell receptors are elevated by a factor of 10 in malignant human breast tissue.
IGF-1 plasma concentrations are higher in breast cancer patients than in healthy patients. (As an aside, this is how the breast cancer drug tamoxifen exerts its action—by reducing blood IGF-1 levels.)
According to Dr. Epstein, IGF-1 blocks your natural defense mechanisms against early microscopic cancers—it prevents apoptosis of cancer cells, or programmed cellular self-destruction.
The breast tissues of female fetuses and infants are especially sensitive to hormonal influences and cancer-causing chemicals. Infants and children exposed to high IGF-1 early on may become “sensitized,” leading to health problems later in life, such as breast enlargement in infants and young children, and breast cancer in adult women. Yet, despite these elevated risks to children, few schools make rBGH-free or organic milk available, nor do most state governments under low-income food programs. A study authored by Dr. Epstein demonstrated that IGF-1 in rBGH milk is a potential risk factor for both breast and gastrointestinal cancers. And a study published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention concluded that diet can impact cancer risk by influencing IGF-1 level.
The risks don’t end with breast cancer.
Ten studies show that consuming milk from rBGH-treated cows raises your risk for colon cancer. Seven studies document this for prostate cancer. If you want more information on this topic, I recommend reading Dr. Epstein’s 2006 book, What’s In Your Milk?
Are You Drinking rBGH Milk?
You very well may be drinking rBGH milk, or eating rBGH cheese or yogurt, as no labeling is required. This is despite the fact that surveys show that more than 80 percent of Americans want it labeled, but the government, as usual, continues bowing to industry lobbyists. The good news is, as increasing numbers of consumers and dairies choose to avoid rBGH, you can find labels that say “rBGH-free” or a similar variation. Organic milk is also rBGH-free. According to the Hartman Group, organic milk is now among the first organic product consumers buy.
Organic milk is enjoying an annual growth rate of about 20 percent, while overall milk consumption has dropped by about 10 percent.
Organic milk is certainly preferable to milk that contains this dangerous hormone. However, I still don’t recommend drinking any milk that is pasteurized—organic or otherwise. You can avoid the risks of rBGH, as well as pasteurization, by drinking only raw milk that comes from a small farmer you know and trust. The milk issue is really part of the larger problem of genetic manipulation of our food supply. The more you can avoid genetically modified (GM) and highly processed foods, the healthier you and your family will be.
HERE ARE THREE THINGS THAT YOU CAN DO:
1. Do not buy milk from cows treated with rBGH. Unless the milk-label states “NO rBGH”, you can assume the milk is contaminated. rBGH has become so widely used by dairy farmers. Most health food stores sell rBGH-free milk.
2. Contact your local supermarket and find out if they have a policy regarding rBGH and milk. Make clear that you would like rBGH-free milk.
3. Write to the FDA and express your concern that they are restricting the labeling
If you want to use an article on your site please click here. This content may be copied in full, with copyright, contact, creation and information intact, without specific permission, when used only in a not-for-profit format. If any other use is desired, permission in writing from Dr. Mercola is required.
Let’s focus on Breast Health, exploring ways to prevent cancer at a cellular level and minimize our exposure to radiation.
While commonly performed, mammograms are uncomfortable and use ionizing and cancer-causing radiation. It is true that mammograms have saved lives and been helpful in detecting cancer. Many women are still alive today because the cancer was found at a treatable stage, and many are also firm believers in the Pink Ribbon campaigns. And rightly so, because they are survivors of this wicked disease!
Mammograms have been touted as the Gold Standard for over 35 years, yet they are far from perfect. But they’re what women are being offered, and everything else is shunned as misinformation or not scientific.
Mammograms have come under scrutiny over the past 10 years and rightly so. Millions of women are subjected to ionizing radiation every year at the directive of their health care providers. Many women, including some doctors, fear mammograms are causing over-treatment and resulting in more cases of cancer.
According to a 2012 study, The Effects of Three Decades of Screening Mammography on Breast Cancer Incidence, published by scientists in the New England Journal of Medicine, 1.3 million women have received unnecessary and invasive cancer treatments including surgery, radiation, mastectomies, hormone treatment and chemotherapy over the last 30 years. This is largely due to mammograms detecting harmless tumors, lumps, bumps, or cysts.
Also, a study by the Journal of American Medicine found that mammography misses about 50% of tumors in women with dense breasts! This is not a good track record.
The current dialog on breast cancer focuses on finding it and treating it. Treatment and more treatment is being done. However, the risk of breast cancer is four to five times greater in women who have increased density in more than 75% of their breast tissue than in women with little or no density in the breast. One-third of all breast cancers are found in women who have increased breast density in over 50% of their breast.
What exactly is dense breast tissue?
Having dense breast tissue is very common but not abnormal. After a mammogram, ultrasound or MRI a woman may be told she has “increased breast density.” Increased breast density, as detected through these screening techniques, is a strong known risk factor for breast cancer. So what does it mean?
Let’s start by addressing dense breasts and mammograms. Dense breasts make it difficult to identify the tumor on the mammogram.
It is difficult to see a lump, cyst or tumor on a mammogram or ultrasound when there is dense breast tissue present. (See Category C and D in the chart.) Notice how white the breasts are? A tumor is white and so is connective tissue, so it’s a lot like looking for a snowball in a snowstorm!
Types of Dense Breasts
Types of Dense Breasts
Breast tissue is made up of fat, glandular, and fibrous connective tissue. Fat is less dense and appears dark on a mammogram, while glandular and connective tissues are denser and appear light. Your breast will be seen as dense if you have a lot of fibrous or glandular tissue and not much fat in the tissue.
Lobules produce milk and are often called glandular tissue.
Ducts are the tiny tubes that carry milk from the lobules to the nipple.
Fibrous tissue andfat give breasts their size and shape and hold the other structures in place.
Your breast tissue may be called dense if you have a lot of fibrous or glandular tissue and not much fat in the breasts. For most women, breasts become less dense with age, but in some women, there’s little change. Although, there seems to be a link between density and older women who were exposed to Phthalates and BPS’s from hard plastics.
What about breast ultrasound or MRI?
Studies have shown that breast ultrasounds and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can help find some cancers that can’t be seen on a mammogram. But the risk is that both ultrasounds and MRIs show more positive findings that turn out not to be cancer. That could result in an unnecessary biopsy.
So, getting extra tests isn’t the solution. Ultrasounds and MRI may not be covered by insurance, as such a policy for dense-breasted women would cost the insurance company a lot in extra tests and false alarms for a small benefit.
What about 3D mammography?
3D mammography, or tomosynthesis, has about a 60% sensitivity, still uses compression and will expose you to 38% more ionizing radiation, which is the most dangerous kind of radiation. This is what you are trying to avoid. So getting extra tests is not necessarily the solution.
The good news is that breast density can diminish over time. However, women whose breast density does not diminish over time are more likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer if they are depending only on anatomical screenings via a mammogram or an ultrasound.
Thermography detects heat and does not detect anatomical structures. So if a woman has a lump or bump and thermography does not detect heat, then it is most often benign—and up to 80% of biopsies can be avoided. Thermography is an adjunct to an anatomical screening, preferably used with ultrasound because it is radiation free—and isn’t that what you are trying to avoid?
The mammogram on the bottom right shows a woman with a very dense breast.Notice how white it is. The thermographic image about clearly shows the heat of the tumor on her breast.
What Causes Increased Breast Density?
Breast tissue develops primarily during puberty and is altered during pregnancy, breastfeeding, and menopause. Dense breast tissue can be linked to genetic factors; menstrual and reproductive factors; environmental factors; exposure to higher estrogen levels in utero; dietary and lifestyle habits; and hormonal indicators.
Birth control pills can increase density. The longer you use contraceptives, the more density there will be in your breasts. Increased weight gain in adulthood is a factor, as is hormone use starting from age 22 to 28. Alcohol consumption, red meat, sugar and caffeine also increase density.
Is there anything to make your breasts less dense? If you take limited advice from mainstream medicine, the answer is no! There is no diet, no yoga pose, no type of strength training, no pills, no shots—you are stuck with what nature gave you. Unacceptable!
How can you reduce breast density?
Breast feed for at least six months.
Increase healthy fats: olive oil and flax seed oil, for example. Use these oils raw, as these have a low burn point.
Eliminate red meat or greatly reduce it.
Limit alcohol to one drink a week.
Sugar has no redeeming value, so cut it out. It feeds cancer cells.
Eliminate caffeine. Coffee turns into estrogen within 45 minutes.
Increase fiber intake through flax, chia seeds and psyllium. The more fiber you eat, the more estrogen is removed from the body
Move toward a plant-based diet. Breasts love all things green—especially the cruciferous family of vegetables.
Restrict carbohydrates as they turn into sugar.
Drink organic green tea.
Try breast massage with specific oils for breast health.
As you can see, breast density is a very common condition, and there is an environmentally safe solution for both screening and alleviation.
Be proactive when it comes to your breast health, especially if you have dense breasts. Here’s to happy healthy breasts!
Share this information with your friends. We all want to have healthy breasts and keep them for the rest of our lives!
During my many years as a thermographer, I’ve learned that a great majority of women who seek out thermography have dense breasts. Many have had years of mammograms and/or biopsies with benign results, and all of them want to avoid radiation and compression.
In fact, more than 40% of women have dense breast tissue. If a woman relies on anatomical screenings of mammography and ultrasound, her chances of getting breast cancer are around 70%. For women with dense breasts and/or breast implants this has always been a problem, but this is still the standard of screening.
The Disadvantages of Mammography for Dense Breast Tissue
A mammogram uses radiation and finds a tumor after it has been in state of angioneogenesis, or producing heat as cells are replicating. So, mammograms find tumors after they have become large enough to be seen on anatomical studies (mammogram, ultrasound or MRI).
This means that by the time a mammogram finds breast cancer, it has been in the stages of “cells on fire” for anywhere from 7 to 10 years. This is NOT prevention!
Mammography is also a highly ineffective examination for women with dense breasts, with a sensitivity between 28% and 50%.
Tumors are even harder to detect, because both a tumor and the connective tissue of dense breasts appear white on a mammogram. To find a tumor on a mammogram with dense breast tissue is like looking for a snowball in a snowstorm!
Thermography is beneficial because it picks up a tumor as heat. This gives you time to make lifestyle changes and explore early intervention—before a tumor is big enough to appear on an anatomical study.
In a 2008 study by The American Breast Surgeon Department of Surgery at the New York Presbyterian Hospital–Cornell, researchers concluded that thermography was highly beneficial for women with dense breast tissue.
So why don’t doctors give us the option of thermography? They still recommend mammograms, despite them being an ineffective screening method for dense breasts and delivering more cumulative and potentially cancer-causing radiation.
Adding the Power of AWBUS to Thermography
Women with dense breasts who screen with thermography are recommended to follow up with an ultrasound. Thermography is an adjunct to an anatomical screening. While the ultrasound is not that effective for dense breasts, a new anatomical technology is now available to improve the detection of cancer in women with dense breasts and implants.
AWBUS (Automated Whole Breast Ultrasound Screenings) is a supplementary ultrasound examination of both breasts that can find small cancers that mammography may miss. AWBUS can increase confidence in your diagnoses. When done in conjunction with a thermogram, it can find more cancers in women with dense breasts than by mammography or standard ultrasound alone.
Watch this TEDx Talk with Dr. Kelly who explains:
3D tomosynthesis is also recommended for women with a breast density grade of 2-3. 3D tomosynthesis improves the visualization of calcifications and small cancers that can be hidden by overlapping tissue. Yet it delivers 38% more ionizing radiation than a standard mammogram. Again, Ionizing radiation is the most dangerous radiation. Radiation is cumulative and can be a risk factor for creating cancer.
The combination of AWBUS and thermography are environmentally safe, radiation free and provide early detection. This makes it a game changer in breast screening technology. AWBUS is most advantageous for women with a breast density grade of 3-4.
Please share this information with your women friends!
Note: At this time, there is no guarantee that your insurance company will cover an Automated Whole Breast Ultrasound. I recommend you contact your insurance company to find out if you are covered under your specific program.
I was so thrilled to sit down with Alexis Brink of Jin Shin Institute to talk about one of my favorite topics: breast thermography.
If you haven’t heard of Jin Shin, it’s a Japanese healing art that uses hands to balance the energetic body, mind and spirit. Jin Shin Institute is in New York and offers events, education and healing sessions.
We started with a background on breast thermography, including the fact that it was actually covered by insurance until 1984 and recommended as an adjunct to breast cancer screening.
Breast thermography still is a common screening method in many countries, including Spain, Brazil, Japan, Germany, Canada and India.
While mammography is a word that’s far more well-known, it often leads to overdiagnosis and overtreatment. As a result, many women are getting biopsies who don’t need them—according to the NIH, 80% of biopsies are false positives, meaning they look like cancer but aren’t.
Watch this interview on breast thermography to learn more, including:
What thermography is and how it works.
Why and how mammography can lead to false positives.
Where the estrogens that create inflammation are coming from.
The role that inflammation plays in breast cancer detection.
Whether or not thermography can be used for the whole body.
What your bra might be doing to your body plus some options for big-breasted women!
How a broccoli seed with “innate wisdom” helped a client with vascular issues.
A warm thank you to Alexis for having me on the show!
As a clinical breast thermographer, I see more and more fibrocystic breast cases than any other abnormality of the breast.
Fibrocystic breast syndrome or disease is a common condition. It is also called cystic breasts or mammary dysplasia.
Breasts can feel swollen or have a different texture, or even feel lumpier than they did yesterday. Lumps, be it of any kind, in the breast, triggers fears of cancer. Both benign and malignant lumps are very different in texture and density.
Most breast lumps that women feel – eight out of ten – aren’t cancer.
It’s more common for them to be a cyst (a sac) or a fibroadenoma (an abnormal growth that’s not cancer). Some lumps come and go during a woman’s menstrual cycle.
Mammograms are often performed on women with fibrocystic breasts. Despite a great deal of evidence citing no benefit and much harm from mammograms women are recommended to have them annually.
There is disagreement as to the age women should commence this procedure.
Characteristics of Fibrocystic Breasts
Fibrocystic changes are characterized by breasts that are lumpy with many irregularities in the breast tissue itself. Fibrocystic breasts seem to occur when a woman’s breasts are overly sensitive to fluctuating hormone levels. Women with fibrocystic changes may have pain and/or lumps.
Over half of all women will experience fibrocystic breasts at some time in their lives, but are fibrocystic breasts really a “disease”?
Many in the medical community say referring to it as a disease is a “misnomer.”
Fibrocystic disease or syndrome is highly prevalent in today’s industrialized nations. This may be common, but it doesn’t make it normal. It is important to note that the symptoms of fibrocystic breasts are different from those of breast cancer.
When you have fibrocystic breasts, you should not experience:
Any type of irregular nipple discharge
Bleeding from the nipples
A growth or firming of specific lumps over time
Changes in breast skin, such as the development of a rash, redness, or the formation of dimpling of the skin
A thickening of the skin
Changes in nipple angle (pointing more down, sideways or up than normal)
The inversion of the nipple into the body
Discoloration of the nipple or areola
Changing in shape of the areola
If you experience any of the above symptoms, contact your medical professional immediately for a thorough examination.
Fibrocystic breast is associated with estrogen dominance. It can occur due to changes in a woman’s hormonal levels and is more common in women of child-bearing age.
However, this is not limited to women of childbearing age. As seen in thermographic imaging, it can show up in women of all ages.
This is not just limited to women either as estrogen dominance is also seen in men. Please note as the thermogram can see estrogen dominance, not all experience will experience physical changes in their breast tissue.
This is not a time to panic, but to become proactive.
Thermography For Fibrocystic Breasts
The good news is that thermal imaging/thermography and ultrasound can distinguish between fibrocystic breasts (an almost universally experienced condition) and breast cancer (a significantly less common disease).
Thermography has the ability to show the heat associated with the backup of estrogens and xenoestrogens in the body, because synthetic estrogens and hormones affect breast and fatty tissue with distinct heat patterns that can only be seen on Infrared Thermal Imaging.
These estrogens show up classically as leopard spots or mottling in thermographic images reflecting inflammation. It is one way you are able to assess the severity of this syndrome and response to lifestyle changes that you will be making. With thermography you can get a real live time image of the toxic load your breast may be carrying.
There is much you can do to reverse fibrocystic breasts and lessen your risk factors, as these can increase your risk of having breast cancer anywhere from two-fold to six-fold.
The Risk Of Environmental Estrogens
When it comes to breast cancer, and breast health, one of the greatest concerns is exposure to environmental estrogens.
There are many kinds of estrogens that are not tested in routine hormone profiles. Environmental contaminants known as xenoestrogens and Bisphenol-A(S) attach to receptor sites and mimic biological estrogens, disrupting your entire endocrine system.
Studies have shown that chronic endocrine dysfunction can lead to cancer, birth defects, infertility, depression, mood disorders, blood abnormalities, frequent illnesses, chronic fatigue, and severe immune suppression.
Our constant exposure to environmental toxins may be partially attributed to the alarming increase in cancers. Estrogen dominance is evident in the weight gain around the midsection.
In thermography it is very common to see the leopard spots, or mottling from the estrogens on fatty tissue, especially belly fat. Fat has been called the third estrogen. The more adipose or fatty tissue there is on a person, the more mottling and estrogen dominance can show up in the thermographic image. That alerts me to suggest to the patient a metabolic detox and balancing of the hormones.
This woman needs a metabolic detox:
Estrogen Dominance
Estrogen dominance is a condition that occurs when there are abnormally high levels of estrogen in the body and reduced levels of progesterone, which has been linked not only to the development of fibrocystic breasts but also to the development of breast cancer.
According to the late Dr. John Lee, “We believe estrogen dominance is an unrecognized risk factor for breast cancer, and in this context, it makes sense that chronically lumpy and painful breast would also be a risk factor.”
To quote Dr. Patrick Fratellone, “Whenever you find these estrogens on a woman’s breast in thermography get rid of it as soon as possible. These are toxins. You wouldn’t leave toxins lying on your kitchen table, so why would you leave them on your breast?”
Most doctors know about estrogen deficiency but not estrogen dominance. If you would like more information on how to detox these toxins from your body, contact me for a consultation on recommended lifestyle changes with supplementations that decrease estrogen.
A Six-Month Comprehensive Protocol for Women to Detox and Reduce Harmful Environmental Estrogens While Optimizing and Restoring Breast Health
Prior exam:
Six-month follow up after detox:
Yours in Radiant Health,
Patricia Luccardi
Offering Breast, Upper Body and Full Body Exams
PS: Stay on top of your thermographic follow up. Refer a friend and get $50 off your next follow up. Contact me today to schedule.
Thermography is radiation-free, painless, safe, preventive screening regardless of age, size, density or nursing.
Remember the old canary in the coal mine? Miners used to carry caged canaries down into the mines with them, and if there was methane or carbon monoxide, the canary would die before the gas became hazardous to humans.
When it comes to our breast health, we can’t wait for the canary! Did you know that 1 out of 7 women will get breast cancer in her lifetime? That means that you and/or someone you know – your daughter, mother, friends, co-workers – will develop it. We can’t afford to wait around!
How Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals Promote Cancer
Our constant exposure to environmental toxins may be partially attributed to the alarming increase in cancers. The class of chemicals that affect breast tissue the most are called xenoestrogens (also known as endocrine disrupting chemicals or EDCs) since they imitate and enhance estrogen activity.
They’re also sometimes referred to as the 3 P’s: Pesticides, Plastics, and Petroleum. These EDCs have been called a potential breast cancer risk because they interfere with or mimic the body’s natural hormonal system, and hormones have been shown to affect breast cancer risk.
These chemicals can increase susceptibility to breast cancer by:
Feeding a breast tumor that’s already present.
Changing the composition of the breast, leaving it more vulnerable to carcinogens.
Don’t Panic, Be Proactive
Xenoestrogens can be detected on thermography, because synthetic estrogens and hormones affect breast and fatty tissue with distinct heat patterns that can only be seen on Infrared Thermal Imaging. Usually, these estrogens show up as leopard spots or mottling in thermographic images.
Thermography is a radiation-free screening procedure that uses infrared heat to detect breast disease or possible tumors. It can detect changes in your breasts five to eight years before a diagnosis.
Every woman should know the condition of her breast. Let us help you detox and restore breast health.
If there was a pain-free way to detect cancer BEFORE it starts would you want to know about it?
Every woman dreads the thought of getting a mammogram. It’s a painful, nerve wrecking experience. But worse than that, mammograms often don’t detect cancer until it’s progressed into full-blown breast cancer.
In this video, Dr. Minkoff explains how thermography can detect breast cancer sooner when breast cancer first develops.
Watch this short video to learn more about how Thermography detects cancer sooner than mammograms.
Thermography uses an infared camera to detect heat changes that occur in the breast. When cancer first develops, it can create tumors and blood vessel growth in the breasts.
Thermography can detect these heat changes before they become active cancer.
This allows your doctor to recommend less evasive treatment such as lifestyle changes, hormonal support, and detoxification to stop it from progressing to breast cancer.
There has been a lot of debate over whether wearing a bra results in a higher risk of breast cancer or not.
What I can say with certainty is that wearing a tight-fitting bra is like wearing a tourniquet. It cuts off lymph node drainage. Your lymph nodes help you excrete dangerous toxins from your body.
When the flow is constricted by wearing a tight-fitting bra, that can inhibit the body’s natural ability to drain these toxins.
That allows all the stagnant toxin-rich fluid to build up and become a breeding ground for bacteria and cancer cells.
3 Tips to Avoid this Risk
Go to a store that will provide you with a professional bra fitting that measures and recommends the best bra size and type recommended for you.
Avoid underwire bras. The metal in underwire bras can act as an antenna that attracts electromagnetic fields that can increase your risk of breast cancer. If you must wear underwire bras, find one with a plastic underwire that will reduce the risk factors.
Remove your bra at night to allow a chance for complete circulation in the area. This will give your body a chance to release those built up toxins.
Make Healthy Choices That Support Your Body
If changing your bra would help you to live a longer, healthier life, wouldn’t you want to do that? Simple changes can make a big difference in reducing your risk for breast cancer.
Organic milk is enjoying an annual growth rate of about 20 percent, while overall milk consumption has dropped by about 10 percent.
Our constant exposure to environmental toxins may be partially attributed to the alarming increase in cancers. The class of chemicals that affect breast tissue the most are called xenoestrogens (also known as endocrine disrupting chemicals or EDCs) since they imitate and enhance estrogen activity.
What I can say with certainty is that wearing a tight-fitting bra is like wearing a tourniquet. It cuts off lymph node drainage. Your lymph nodes help you excrete dangerous toxins from your body.
3 Tips to Avoid this Risk