Latest technology, excellent care help patient beat cancer for a second time

Pauline McInturff can’t say enough about the value of early detection in beating breast cancer.Pauline, who battled breast cancer in 2004, is diligent about her follow-up care, including regular mammograms. After a suspicious mammogram last spring, Pauline’s doctor, Dr. Tom Warren, breast specialist at Southwest Cancer Center Clinic, referred Pauline to Dr. Jui-Lien “Lillian” Chou, founder of Wellness Lubbock and Aurora Breast Center San Antonio. To ensure the most accurate diagnostic images, Dr. Tom Warren recommended Pauline have a breast MRI prior to having an invasive procedure like a biopsy.The Breast Center at Wellness Lubbock is equipped with the latest state-of-the-art technology for breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. Not available at any other health care center in West Texas is the Aurora Dedicated Breast MRI. Unlike mammography and ultrasound, which have only about a 50 percent sensitivity for breast cancer, breast MRI has a more than a 95 percent sensitivity for detecting breast cancer and can provide answers for patients who receive inconclusive or conflicting imaging/clinical findings for the presence of breast cancer.Breast MRI can be of particular value to breast cancer survivors like Pauline. Scars as a result of breast surgery can be misinterpreted on a mammogram as a potential recurrence of cancer, leading to unnecessary biopsies, which in turn lead to additional scarring. With its superior image quality and resolution, breast MRI allows the radiologist to distinguish the difference between scars and potential cancers to avoid repeated and unnecessary biopsies. If a biopsy is warranted, the breast MRI images pinpoint the location with greater  accuracy.“For breast cancer survivors, follow-ups with breast MRI are definitely recommended,” stresses Dr. Chou. “Not only does breast MRI give us the resolution needed to differentiate scars from potential breast cancer reoccurrence, breast MRI can also catch new breast cancer earlier, giving the patient the best options for treatment and a better chance for survival.”Pauline’s breast MRI and subsequent biopsy did confirm the diagnosis of a new breast cancer, but it was caught early. Following a lumpectomy and axillary lymph node sampling and a round of radiation therapy, Pauline&rsquo

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