Effect of Issuing an Invitation for Breast Cancer Screening to Women Aged 65 to 69

Abstract

Objective –Breast cancer screening is available to all women over 50 in the United Kingdom on the National Health Service breast screening programme. Only women aged between 50 and 64 receive a written invitation, with women over 64 being expected to self refer. Unfortunately, despite the higher incidence of breast cancer in the older age group only a very small proportion of women over 64 attend for screening. The aim of the study was to test the hypothesis that women between the ages of 65 and 69 will attend for screening if invited. Method –Women aged 65 to 69 were invited for screening from general practices in the Inverness area and were treated in all respects as the usual screening age group. Results –An uptake of 76% was achieved with a cancer detection rate of 9.3 per thousand. Conclusion –These results lend weight to the suggestion that women in this age group should receive a specific invitation for breast cancer screening.