WMH Now Offering 3D Mammography in Pike

(Honesdale, July 22, 2019)…It offers the most precise imaging of the breast to date and the lowest dose of radiation of any Digital Breast Tomosynthesis system approved by the Food and Drug Administration. It’s General Electric’s Senographe Pristina, and it’s now available at the Pike County Medical Center, a Wayne Memorial outpatient site in Lords Valley.

“We are pleased to bring today’s most advanced mammography technology to our patients in Pike County,” said James Hockenbury, director Ancillary Services. He added that the Senographe Pristina “also offers comfort, another key encouragement for women to be screened.”

The Pristina, which can reconstruct a 3-dimensional image from a single scan, has armrests and rounded edges instead of hard-to-reach handgrips and sharp corners. The breast is compressed as in traditional mammography, but relaxed muscles help simplify positioning and pressure and ultimately improve image quality.

Wayne Memorial has been offering the same 3D breast tomosynthesis system to patients at its hospital in Honesdale, Wayne County, and in its mobile unit since last year. The hospital’s Chief of Radiology, Charles Barax, MD, emphasized that “early detection significantly enhances a woman’s chance of surviving breast cancer. Screening is crucial. And we’re excited to offer digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) that has less radiation than most other systems and is designed with patient comfort in mind.”

According to GE, the Pristina delivers “superior diagnostic accuracy at the same dose as 2D mammography, the lowest patient dose of all government approved DBT systems.”

Annual screening mammograms are recommended by the American Cancer Society for women age 40 and over. Mammography may be performed on younger women when there is a strong family history of breast cancer or when the woman has particular symptoms.

Wayne Memorial performs approximately 4,000 mammograms a year.  Its mobile mammography unit travels to Hamlin, Carbondale, Forest City and Lake Como.

The Pike Medical Center, 750 Route 739, is open Monday – Friday 7:30am – 3:30pm. The Center also offers blood draws, bone density scans and x-rays. To make an appointment for a 3D mammogram, patients who have a prescription can call Wayne Memorial Central Scheduling at 570-251-6689.

Photo: Mammography Technologist Ellen Scarisbrick, RT (M), with Wayne Memorial Hospital’s new 3D digital mammography system, the GE Senographe Pristina, at the Pike County Medical Center, Lords Valley.