By Erika Mosteller
Across Greater Dalton, a mammography on the go unit is pulling up outside a church, a school, or a workplace. Community members will no longer have to drive to Atlanta, or take a half-day off work, for an annual breast screening and potentially life-saving chance to catch something early.
This new asset began serving our community in August, thanks to a generous gift from the Peeples Family Foundation, provided through the Whitfield Healthcare Foundation, whose philanthropic support helps expand access to healthcare across our community.
The belief behind the unit stems from the vision and leadership of Dr. Adrian Miller, the breast imaging radiology specialist for Hamilton Medical Center’s Peeples Cancer Institute (PCI). Dr. Miller has spent her whole career promoting what science and her experience proves: screening saves lives, and the harder it is to get screened, the more lives slip through.
The numbers back her up. When breast cancer is caught while still confined to the breast, the national five-year survival rate is over 99 percent. Once the cancer has spread to nearby lymph nodes or other parts of the body, that number drops to around 86 percent and 31 percent, respectively. Those percentages translate to lives, forging a dire argument for better community screening access through mammography on the go.
“Annual breast cancer screening mammograms save lives. We know this with absolute certainty.”
— Dr. Adrian Miller, Peeples Cancer Institute Breast Imaging Radiology Specialist
National breast cancer death rates have fallen 44 percent since 1989, and doctors credit a mix of earlier detection and better treatment for most of that drop. Miller has watched that play out patient by patient. She completed an extra year of fellowship at the Mayo Clinic just to specialize in breast imaging, training many radiologists never receive. She could practice anywhere, but she chose Dalton four and a half years ago, moved her family here, and has spent every year since partnering with the PCI team to build a masterpiece of breast cancer care.
“We have developed this incredible breast health program,” Dr. Miller explains. Peeples Cancer Institute offers breast screenings, diagnostic breast studies and breast biopsies, while breast MRI and MRI-guided biopsies are performed at Hamilton Medical Center. Patients receive same day diagnostic results, and Dr. Miller reads every scan herself as a dedicated breast imaging specialist.
Dr. Lisa Duhaime, PCI’s medical oncologist, puts it plainly: anything the Winship Cancer Institute at Emory Medical Center offers, short of an active clinical trial, patients can access right here.
“Patients are often surprised by how much advanced cancer care is available right here in Dalton,” Dr. Duhaime said. “Our goal is to provide exceptional care close to home whenever possible, while working closely with trusted partners like Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University if additional specialized services are needed. Our patients appreciate being able to receive advanced cancer care close to home.”
The state of the art technology is impressive, and so are the percentages behind the results. But ask either doctor what truly sets PCI apart, and the answer isn’t a machine or a statistic. It’s the people running it. “From the moment they walk through the doors [of PCI], people feel that someone actually cares. They’re not just another number.” Dr. Duhaime declares. “And it is absolutely true. I’ve worked in several different facilities over my career, and there is something different about PCI. I like to say we feel God here… I truly believe that’s the big difference.”
Dr. Miller sits in her car some mornings and cries before her shift starts, carrying the weight of the diagnoses she has to deliver that day. Dr. Duhaime holds deep conviction that her work is a calling, not a career, and she says patients become friends she thinks about for years after their treatment ends. Both doctors talk about their patients the way you’d talk about neighbors, because that’s what they are.
PCI has built a program around that same idea. New patients can meet medical oncology, radiation oncology, a social worker, a case worker, and a dietician in a single day, with every specialist reviewing every case so nothing gets missed. The goal is to get a patient from biopsy to a full care team within a week. The vision behind this speed is grounded in medical practitioners treating patients like they’re all in it together. “We walk this road together, doctor and patient, and it’s an honor to walk with them,” Dr. Miller states.
The mammography-on-the-go unit is that philosophy on wheels. It exists because Dr. Miller, the Whitfield Healthcare Foundation, and the PCI team decided that world-class breast screening and care shouldn’t depend on how far someone can drive, how many hours they can take off work, or whether they even have a car that can make the trip.
Early detection and effective care only work if people have access, and people are more likely to get screening and care when it’s easy. That’s the real power here: the latest screening and treatment technology combined with a program built by humans who decided their neighbors deserved better odds, and then went and built the odds themselves, right here in Dalton.
The Mammography-on-the-Go unit is currently visiting locations around Whitfield County. To schedule your screening On-the-Go or at Peeples Cancer Institute, call 706.281.8309, email MobileMammoScheduling@vhcs.org, or visit VitruvianHealth.com/PCI-MammoOnTheGo.
Photo credits: Whitfield Healthcare Foundation + Amanda Lovelace
