QualChoice of Arkansas Supports Yearly Mammograms

QualChoice of Arkansas, Inc., a Little Rock-based health management and benefits administrator, announced its intention to continue existing coverage of annual mammograms for women ages 40 and up. 

The support in favor of routine screening follows the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force’s (USPSTF) statement that most women younger than 50 should not get routine screening mammograms.
“QualChoice will not be making changes to its mammography coverage and will continue to recommend annual screening using mammography and clinical breast examination for all women beginning at age 40," QualChoice of Arkansas president and CEO Mike Stock said in a statement. "We are a strong proponent of preventive health services and want to assure our members that their coverage will not be changed, although all due diligence will be used in evaluating the USPSTF recommendations.  Our primary concern is for the health and wellness of our members and we believe that the previous guidelines have indeed saved lives.”

The task force’s new recommendations state that most women between 40 and 49 years of age do not require routine screening and that women ages 50 to 74 should be screened every two years.  Those recommendations differ from previous guidelines that called for routine screenings every year or two for women age 40 and older.

The USPSTF also recommends each woman consider her individual benefits and risks and discuss them with her health care provider before making a decision on when to start screening mammography and how often to get one. The report concludes that screening mammography remains an important, effective tool for early detection of breast cancer. It also states that the evidence of benefit might vary, according to age and individual risk factors.

According to the American Cancer Society, breast cancer is the most common cancer for U.S. women, with nearly 200,000 women expected to be diagnosed with the invasive form of the disease this year.