University Events Calendar

10 November, 2016

Screening for breast cancer public lecture

Date/Time: Thursday, 10 November 2016, 5:30 pm to 6:30 pm

Location: Napier building, Lecture theatre 102, North Terrace campus

Cost: FREE

More information: Visit website

The Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences is proud to present the Executive Dean's Public Lecture Series: Screening for breast cancer: leaving behind a manufactured controversy and optimizing its future presented by Dr Gelareh Farshid.

Population based mammographic screening is a bold response to the significant public health issue of breast cancer, the leading cause of female cancer deaths world-wide.

Despite being an intensely studied field of medicine, screening mammography remains controversial. Unlike mammograms, the debate is not truly black and white. Screening has strengths and drawbacks.

Screening programs were conceived in a simpler world 20-30 years ago, when shielded from the truth of the biological complexity of the disease, we could refer to breast cancer as if it were one disease. Research now confronts us with the bewildering reality that the disease we seek to combat is a complex array of different neoplasms. Screening is optimised for the detection of specific, common molecular subtypes but not for all breast cancers.

To develop more nuanced approaches to prevention, diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer we should start by acknowledging its complexity.

Dr Gelareh Farshid is a surgical pathologist and expert in population based mammographic screening, serving as the Clinical Director of BreastScreen SA for the last decade, until July 2016. Gelareh's research focus includes optimizing the assessment outcomes for women with screen detected breast lesions and improving the accuracy of biomarker evaluation.

Contact: Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, Email: fhs.events@adelaide.edu.au