Breast Cancer Awareness Month – Free Mammograms All Year

By Robyn Marlow

Every October, we go all out to celebrate Breast Cancer Awareness month. We pink it out every Friday where the whole staff wears pink. We run specials on mammograms. North Sunflower Medical Center is the first hospital in the Delta to offer 3D mammograms. It’s a great deal. Everyone should take advantage of it.

But here’s an even sweeter deal …

Because we believe there is Just-No-Reason women should not get regular cancer screenings, we partnered up with the Mississippi Department of Health to provide free mammograms and cervical screenings for women 40 to 64 who do not have insurance, Medicare or Medicaid.

Let me say that again: Free Mammograms and Cervical Screenings!

Free Mammograms and Cervical Screenings

It’s called BCCP – Breast and Cervical Cancer Program. If you have insurance, most all carriers cover wellness checks that include mammograms and cervical screenings. If you are on Medicare or Medicaid, they pay for your screenings. And if you don’t have either, there is still no charge.

That’s not just in October. That’s all year round.

And that includes our state-of-the-art 3D mammography’s. We talked to Alice Pyles, the Director of Radiology at NSMC, and she told us the 3D mammography is saving women time and money. “You are able to see the tissue so much more clearly, it is cutting down on call backs.”

She told us that with the old technology, frequently they had to call people back in for a closer look when things in a 2D mammogram looked suspicious. Now they are able to identify problems more clearly and rule out most false alarms. “You save them time and you save them money. But just as important, you save them the worry that something might be wrong when it’s not.”

Watch our new video about the First in the Delta 3D Mammography available at North Sunflower Medical Center:

And speaking of saving time, if you are unable to get away from work, North Sunflower Medical Center is open late every Thursday all year round. Alice told us, “Regular hours are 8:00 to 4:30 Monday to Friday. On Thursdays, our mammographers and cervical screeners are around from noon to 8:00 pm. As I said, there is Just-No-Reason for a woman to skip her mammogram.”

North Sunflower Medical Center Poll: Our Favorite Mississippi Authors

As a follow up to our last story about the Ruleville Little Free Library Conner Seely built for his Eagle Scout project, the results of the poll are in. Your favorite Mississippi author is:

• John Grisham – 80%
• William Faulkner – 15%
• Richard Wright – 1%

No great surprise that John Grisham is most every Mississippian’s favorite author. But what is surprising is that not a single person cast a vote for the Pulitzer Prize-winning Mississippi author Eudora Welty. In addition to winning the Pulitzer for The Optimist’s Daughter, Welty was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980, was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 2000 and her home in Jackson has been designated as a National Historic Landmark.