New 3D breast imaging technology

It’s a brand new breast imaging technology to better diagnose and treat breast disease and it’s made its way to the Gulf Coast just in time for Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October.

Meet Pristina. She’s the newest 3D mammogram technology at Singing River Health System. Dr. James Carter said, “With this machine, we can slice through breasts to look for tumors that may otherwise be obscured by regular mammograms.”

Carter is a diagnostic radiologist at Singing River. He says Pristina is the latest and greatest when it comes to performing mammograms. “It’s similar to a mammogram where the breast will be compressed in two dimensions, but this machine moves back and forth to make these sliced mammograms sliced to the breasts so you can see tumors a lot easier.”

With this new breast imaging technology, specialists can detect and treat abnormalities at the earliest stages.  Lead Mammographer Tina Flint said, “It is high resolution so we’re getting just amazing images and being able to look through that breast tissue one millimeter at a time is just amazing and a game changer.”

Not to mention, it’s a lot faster and more comfortable. “It’s less than ten seconds, the patient will be compressed, you don’t have to hold your breath anymore so that’s always a good thing. It’s actually quick and some women say a little bit more painless,” said Flint.

With breast cancer being the third leading cause of death for women in Mississippi, Dr. Carter says it’s important to do your self-check breast exams and learn more about dense breast tissues. “Whether they have a positive family history, whether they have certain genetic markers for breast disease, whether they have dense breasts or not, if they do we can offer lots of screening tools for the disease, an ultrasound. We have a 3D tomography also, breast MRI.”

Specialists say women over the age of 40 should have a mammogram done every year.