Pushing for better prevention, two doctors open breast imaging center in Clive
Photo by Ann Olson.
BY MACEY SHOFROTH
For many women, waiting until the American Cancer Society’s recommended age of 40 to begin yearly screening mammograms can have terrible consequences.
Especially in Iowa, which has the second-highest rate of cancer in the United States and is the only state where that rate increased in 2023. Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in Iowa, and the later it’s discovered, the less favorable a patient’s outlook becomes.
Two Central Iowa radiologists, Dr. Andrea Lamphiear and Dr. Rachel Preisser, hope to empower women with the knowledge and tools to change that narrative.
“That’s what we want to bring to our patients: empowerment,” Preisser said. “The more you know about your health, the more choices you have, and the better your outcome is going to be.”
In August, the doctors opened Grace Breast Imaging and Medical Spa in Clive. The breast center offers services to screen, diagnose and monitor breast health conditions, along with medical spa and wellness services.
The doctors hope meeting with women earlier and more often will reduce the number of patients suffering from breast cancer in Iowa. Their proactive approach begins with an early risk assessment program.
“The American College of Radiology recommends that you have your [breast cancer] risk assessed when you are 25,” Lamphiear said. “Most women I know, including myself, did not have that done.”
An early breast cancer risk assessment looks at your family history, genetic makeup, health condition and more to determine your risk of breast cancer. Doctors use this to determine if patients need to be monitored earlier and more often and with what tools.
“You may need to start mammograms earlier, and you may need to come in more often,” Lamphiear said. “You may need more than just a mammogram or we may need to take abnormal tissue out. We just want to get to people to let them know to come in and talk to us. Let’s figure out your risk and go from there.”
Preisser explained that since medical professionals began using screening mammograms in the late 1980s, the death rate from breast cancer has decreased by over 40%.
A typical radiologist spends three months out of their 60 months of residency training specifically in breast imaging. Fellowship-trained breast imagers, like Lamphiear and Preisser, receive five times the amount of training. The uniqueness and difficulties of reading mammograms makes specialized training a key tool in the fight against breast cancer.
“A mammogram is the hardest imaging study to read because it’s like a fingerprint,” Preisser said. “Every single mammogram is completely unique to the breasts that made it, and even from right to left they can be different. There’s this huge range of what normal looks like. That’s not the case in any other part of the body.”
Advocating for access
Both doctors have long been passionate about educating women about the importance of being proactive about their breast health. But even when armed with this knowledge, many women are unable to pursue preventative health care due to high costs.
The Affordable Care Act mandated all insurances to cover screening mammograms at no cost to the patient. But any further testing, which Preisser explained is required whenever a mammogram shows an abnormality, would not necessarily be covered.
“We were telling people, ‘Hey, your mammogram is not good and you’re at higher risk for breast cancer.’ The next step is, what are we going to do about it?” Preisser said. “That means a breast MRI, ultrasound, and a lot of expensive tests. So what we were doing before is telling people, ‘Hey, there’s a problem on your mammogram, but I can’t tell you anything unless you pay me a lot of money.’”
The doctors worked with Iowa Army of Pink, a nonprofit dedicated to educating the public about breast density, to pass House File 2489. The law requires insurers to cover those necessary diagnostic tests.
“We don’t want women to come in with late-stage metastatic breast cancer because they didn’t have the money,” Lamphiear said. “This is going to help so many women to be able to get the imaging they need without having to pay out of pocket. Because it’s hundreds of dollars.”
With cost barriers being removed, the doctors hope more and more Central Iowa women will be able to take charge of their breast health. Improving the health outcomes for these women is central to Grace’s mission.
“There’s this opportunity for us to do better for the women in Central Iowa,” Preisser said.
Macey Shofroth is a writer based in Norwalk. She works as a marketing coordinator for CultureALL, a nonprofit boosting inclusion in Iowa, and produces a Substack Newsletter called “The Midwest Creative.”
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