BreastScreen Australia – Policy and practice in relation to symptomatic women

The BreastScreen Australia program selects women on the basis of age alone. It is impractical to rely on the presence or absence of symptoms to decide whether a woman is eligible for the program.

Women with symptoms are actively discouraged from attending the screening program as they need a different type of mammogram. However, if they do present for a mammogram, our policy is to screen them and recommend further investigation, regardless of the screening result.