THUNDER BAY -- Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre's mobile cancer screening bus continues to make its way through Thunder Bay.
The Screen for Life Coach, as it's known, doesn't typically travel beyond the city borders during the winter season, but it did make the short drive into Shuniah.
Every year, about 6,000 women across Northwestern Ontario are screened for breast cancer on the Health Sciences Centre's Screen for Life mobile coach.
It travels through the region providing mammograms to women aged 50 to 74.
Mammographer Julia Bailey has seen many people benefit from early detection.
“Obviously, we never actually want to have anyone with a cancer diagnosis, but it’s really heartening to see that if they do we are catching it early and they have the best possibility for a happy outcome,” Bailey said.
Janeen Mann is a community volunteer, who's been working for several years to bring the coach to Shuniah.
For her, breast cancer detection hits close to home.
“My grandmother, great-grandmother and great-great grandmother all died of breast cancer,” Mann said.
“I really feel it’s important that people get this done. Early detection does save lives.”
Bailey said all the mammogram tests are sent away to a radiologist or a lab location for the pap tests.
“At that point you are going to have to do follow up testing before they can definitively say that there is a diagnosis,” Bailey said.
“That’s all managed between somebody’s primary care provider or in conjunction with navigators we have in our office.”
The Screen for Life Coach will work its way around Thunder Bay through the winter before heading into the surrounding region next spring.
(TBT News)
