Last fall, a sorority on campus sponsored an organization called the Emergen-C PINK Tour (Breast Health and Wellness Team) and this team/trailer was set up in front of the library for the day. I stopped by, spoke with the naturopath heading up this tour (Amanda Ward) and was chagrined to learn that they were promoting thermography for our college-aged students at $250/study.

I was quite sure that this was completely contraindicated, so I checked with Dr. Judy Dean, an American Board of Radiology certified Diagnostic Radiologist and a breast imaging specialist in Santa Barbara for over 20 years. She confirmed my suspicions that our students were being very seriously misled. Her response was the following: “The use of thermography for breast cancer detection is unproven and controversial, at best. While a positive result may be significant, a large number of normal women will have abnormal thermograms. This can result in unnecessary anxiety and unnecessary biopsy of benign, non-cancerous lesions. There is no data to justify the cost of thermography in women before age 40, and it is only approved as an adjunct to mammography for women in the breast cancer age group (not typical college students).â€

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