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New mammography machines in Saskatoon and Regina should help speed up the screening process for women in Saskatchewan.
The machines – which will be operated by the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) – were purchased after the Cancer Foundation of Saskatchewan raised more than $2 million in its effort to speed up breast screening in the province.
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The funding will also add new mobile mamography vehicles to the road for the province’s screening program, dubbed Breast Check. That program is aimed at healthy women 47 and older who experience no breast health concerns, and screening on the mobile mammography bus is offered at eight locations around the province. No referral is needed in order to access the services.
“The combination of these capital investments and efforts by our dedicated health care teams have allowed us to make strides in providing Saskatchewan patients with timely access to breast screening and diagnostics,” Health Minister Jeremy Cockrill said in a statement.
“We appreciate ongoing work by the SHA and Saskatchewan Cancer Agency to improve breast health services in our province. Thank you to the Cancer Foundation of Saskatchewan for their fundraising efforts to purchase additional equipment to increase capacity for screening.”
Richard Dagenais, the SHA’s executive director of medical imaging, said the additional equipment will help improve access to screening services for women in Saskatchewan and will support the expansion of the breast screening age to patients 40 and up.
“We are profoundly grateful to the Cancer Foundation of Saskatchewan, and their generous donors, for their ongoing partnership and support,” Dagenais said.
Nora Yeates, the foundation’s CEO, thanked the donors who helped out with the fundraising campaign, highlighting a $1 million gift from PTI Transformers Inc.
The provincial government has been working to improve breast screening in Saskatchewan after facing criticism for long wait times and an initiative sending patients to receive breast cancer diagnostics at a facility in Calgary.
That initiative has been extended to March of next year, even after the new Breast Health Centre opened its doors in Regina last month.
