EU promotes quality assurance in mammography 

In the framework of the international breast cancer awareness campaign, a series of events was hosted by the European Parliament 17-21 October to raise awareness and promote quality-assured mammography screening in accordance with EU guidelines. "Every year 275,100 women fall ill with breast cancer in the EU - 88,400 women die from the disease," said German Socialist MEP Karin Jöns. 

Breast cancer is the most frequent cause of death among women of aged between 35 and 55. "In the EU, a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer  every two minutes and a woman dies from the disease every six minutes," reads a parliament statement. The chances of a cure increase substantially if the cancer is detected early. Therefore, the Commission will publish the fourth upated version  of the EU guidelines for quality assurance in breast cancer screening (mammography) and diagnosis in late 2005 or early 2006. 

The new edition will, for the first time, include guidelines on multidisciplinary breast cancer units in which women with a diagnosis of breast cancer should receive optimal treatment. New guidlines will be issued also on communication in screening, the physico-technical aspects of digital mammography, certification of diagnostic and screening units and multidisciplinary diagnosis.