A Complete Approach To Care

The St. John Health Breast Care Program is your single source for medical expertise, personalized care, education and support for you and your family.

Our complete breast health program includes:

• Multidisciplinary specialty team of diagnostic and treatment specialists
• Nurse navigators
• Second opinion clinic
• Comprehensive clinical research
• Cancer risk nurses and cancer genetics counselor
• Healing arts, education and support

Your care will be well coordinated and will address all your needs. You can be sure your care is in the hands of highly trained experts that have a passion for healing the body, mind and spirit.

Many Experts, One Focus - You

Following your diagnosis, your physician will present your information at a multidisciplinary breast conference where specialists review your case and develop a consensus opinion for your treatment. Following the conference, if you choose, you will have the opportunity to attend our second opinion clinic where you will be examined, meet with a variety of specialists, and have the opportunity to ask questions. The specialists may include a medical oncologist, a radiation oncologist, a surgeon and a plastic surgeon.

Giving You Access to the Most Up to Date Research and Clinical Trials

One of the greatest advantages the St. John Health Breast Care Program offers is providing the most up-to-date cancer treatments. Patients may be encouraged to consider participating in clinical studies, a study that evaluates new options in an effort to determine the most effective way to treat or prevent cancer. Participating in clinical trials is voluntary. Choosing to participate in a clinical trail is an important personal decision. To assist you in making an informed decision, please discuss with your doctor.  

Healing the Body, Mind and Spirit

Emotional support for you and your family is another important aspect of care that we provide. Our staff includes a nurse navigator, who will give you individual assistance, assuring no information, education, service or support is left to chance, including timely additional physician referrals or testing. We also offer many other specialized programs and services to ensure that you don't have to face this disease alone.

These include:

• Look Good…Feel Better - a program sponsored by American Cancer Society. This free service helps women undergoing cancer treatment learn to cope with appearance-related side effects and regain a sense of self-confidence.
• Support Groups for breast cancer patients meet at various times and locations.
• Reach to Recovery. A service of the American Cancer Society where specially trained breast cancer survivor volunteers meet with newly diagnosed patients to offer support and information.
• Healing Arts Center. Our healing arts program offers a vast array of services, from massage to reflexology to acupuncture to help relieve stress and tension during your treatment. We also offer music and art therapies to help soothe treatment experience.

Genetic Counseling That Can Help Protect Your Family

Because some types of cancer genes have been discovered, it is now possible to evaluate your family members' personal cancer risk. We provide individual analysis of each family members risk with follow-up screening recommendations that may include genetics testing. For an appointment or more information please call 1-888-440-0644.

New Breast Cancer Screening Guidelines

John Health Breast Care Program is strongly opposed to the new recommendations from the United States Preventative Services Task Force (USPSTF). Our breast program will continue to follow the guidelines set forth by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) and the American Cancer Society (ACS).

We feel there is ample data supporting the use and effectiveness of mammography in all women ages 40-50 regardless of risk factors. We acknowledge the detection rate of mammography in this group of women is not as high as in the 50 and over population but are unwilling to let a cancer potentially go undiagnosed for as long as 10 years. We feel that there is emerging data that the use of digital mammography in this population will help increase the detection rate and decrease the number of benign biopsies.

We feel annual screening mammography from 50-74 is necessary as the interval of two years between imaging will have a tremendous impact on stage at diagnosis and thus impact survival.

We disagree with the recommendation to stop screening with mammography at age 75. We know a woman’s risk of breast cancer only increases with age and not screening these women would be ignoring the highest risk population. If a woman chooses to stop her breast cancer screening at age 75 due to decreased life expectancy that should be an individual decision.

Lastly, we disagree with the recommendation to discourage monthly self breast examination. Many of the cancers diagnosed within the St. John Health system are from women who identify a lump on their self breast examinations and discouraging this would be eliminating a powerful tool women can do to help with early detection.

In summary, The St. John Health Breast Care Program continues to support the NCCN and ACS recommendations which are as follows:

Annual Screening Mammography: Starting at age 40 and continuing yearly as long as a woman is in good health

Clinical Breast Exam: Starting at age 20 every 3 years and annually starting at age 40

Breast Self Exam: Monthly starting at age 20

 For More Information

For more information about your breast cancer care, talk with your doctor. Your nurse navigator will also provide you with answers, help and support. Or, call 1-888-440-0644.