Calif. Measure Would Require Women To Be Told of Breast Tissue Condition

September 8, 2011 — California lawmakers are weighing a bill (SB 173) that would require physicians to tell women if they have a condition known as extremely dense breast tissue that could prevent mammograms from detecting cancer cells, the San Jose Mercury News reports. The bill, introduced by Sen. Joseph Simitian (D), has been approved by the state Senate but stalled last month in the Assembly Appropriations Committee.

Both dense breast tissue and tumors create light areas on a mammogram, which makes the cancer difficult to detect. Ultrasound and MRIs can better detect tumors in women with the condition, but they can cost about $300 and $1,700, respectively.

NIH has said that extremely dense breast tissue can be one of the strongest risk factors for cancer. Simitian said that telling "a patient she has no right to know information already held by the radiologist and physician is indefensible."

Debate on the bill has centered on whether too much medical information can cause undue fear and increase costs for women. Physicians argue that they are not opposed to providing information about dense tissue to women but that such information should be limited to high-risk women, including those with a family history of breast cancer or a prior precancerous change in a breast.

Ruth Hoskins -- chair of the Council on Legislation for the California Medical Association, which opposes the bill -- said every woman with the condition would seek more sophisticated screenings. She noted that securing prior authorization from insurers for those screenings can be difficult and that low reimbursements from public insurance plans might dissuade physicians from providing the tests for women who are not privately insured.

If the bill is enacted, California would be the third state -- after Connecticut and Texas -- to require physicians to notify women that they have the dense breast tissue condition (Harmon, San Jose Mercury News, 9/6).