So if someone was going to ask you what were your reasons for attending, because you go every three years, what would your personal reasons be?

Because it’s better to be safe than sorry. To make sure that there is nothing that, perhaps you cat feel a lump or anything and it’s further in, and to make sure that yore healthy because the longer you leave it the worse it is for anyone surely;

What would you say to women who don’t attend for screening?

I think that they’re very unwise, especially in this day and age where there is so much knowledge and obviously cancer treatment is getting better I believe. I’m fortunate not to have any cancer treatment, but, and it would be, it would be so quick to help them and get sorted out;

I mean women should know that it’s nothing to be afraid of, it’s something that is for their benefit actually.

So you chose to go at the age of 49. What would your, if someone asked you what are your reasons for attending for breast screening, what would your reasons be?

Purely that I was aware that, you know when you reach the age of 50, the statistics of breast cancer go up and I just felt it was a safe, a safety thing really just to do that. That was my own personal feelings. And, as I say, simply because you know as you get older the statistics are higher;

I suppose because I’ve been offered a chance and the opportunity. And also you like to be told that you’re well, that’s another thing. People like to be told that theres nothing wrong with them, that they’re well. So we don’t, in this country, we don’t go for annual check-ups, like they do in the States, we don’t have that service and we usually go and see the doctor if were sick. But this is a procedure that you go relatively, well you think you’re well when you go in, think you’re OK when you go and you feel OK and it’s always nice to be told you’re OK. It’s nice to be told you’re well. And that’s a positive side of having the screening;

My personal reason is, well the big word is ‘reassurance really. Yes and as I say if you’re unfortunate enough to have a problem, the sooner you find out the better. And the sooner you can think positively and do something about it;

So you always attend regularly for breast screening;

Always yes;

Have you always attended for other kinds of screening like cervical screening;

Yes, yes;

So in general you’re quite positive about breast screening;

I am yes;

Is there anything you’d want to tell other people about breast screening?

No just that, don’t worry about it, you know, don’t worry about the embarrassment or anything just, just go for your own sanity, just go.

Well, to prevent getting breast cancer and detecting it. Because I know that if it’s detected early theres a lot you can do but people that aren’t detected early on do suffer.

It’s not as if it does you any harm whatsoever, it does you good more than anything. And the very slightest two seconds of pain is nothing, really, it’s just like, it’s just a little bit more painful than cutting your finger, I suppose. It’s not very, not very bad at all. No, I would say, no you must go.

I’ve been impressed [with breast screening]. I’ve been impressed and I’ve been very satisfied and hopefully, I don’t actually get breast cancer but if I did, I know it would be detected at early stages and I’d be happy to have whatever treatment I need to have.

Because you’ve read quite a bit, do you think it takes the fear away?

Yes it does, yes. The more you know about something, the less scary it is.

Is there anything else you would want to tell people about breast screening?

I think I’ve pretty much said that I’m in favour of it and I believe every woman over the age of 40 should go for it, theres no reason why not.

Well I felt that if someone was offering me this opportunity to see if I was okay, I’ve always gone for smear tests and I’ve never had any hesitation to go for them. I am a positive person, I’ve always been a positive person and I felt if theres something there, I would rather know rather than not know. So I felt it was an opportunity to safeguard my life. If you need to go to the dentist, if you need glasses you go to the optician, you know so it was an opportunity for me to have something carried out that normally wouldn’t happen.

And if I was to ask you what are your reasons for attending what would your reasons be;

Well because I had this cyst, probably if I hadn’t have had it I might, I don’t know, I might have gone really you know but that’s made me more aware to go;

Well I’d tell them [other people] that they ought to go really [for breast screening], I think everybody ought to go. If it’s only for, because I mean some people like you’ve heard about them and they’ve had these cancer things and all this, they don’t even know they’ve got them do they; I was just lucky really that mine, I don’t know whether that is the way the cysts go, like stick out like a little lump, you know what I mean, it wasn’t nothing, just like a little white lump you know.

I went for my first mammogram, I was called for my first mammogram and I must say, looking back, I was incredibly naive about it. I went really out of curiosity because I’d reached the age where I knew you had screening, you had mammograms and we had talked about them and I ended up in it innocently because I really went to find out what it was like because I felt so certain that I didn’t have any form of breast cancer;

I didn’t feel myself to have any of the risk factors that I knew about at that stage. I’m quite small so I knew that overweight people were slightly more at risk, theres no family history. I had breast-fed my children and all these things I thought put me out of the risk category. And because I didn’t feel myself to have risk factors I thought I was safe from breast cancer and I realise now that was an absurd assumption. But I somehow thought that if you weren’t at risk you were safe. So I only went out of curiosity, I didn’t really go because I had considered I would be affected. And as a result I don’t think I read the screening literature particularly carefully. I just went along.

So, if I was going to ask you, right at the beginning, what were your reasons for going for screening, what would you say?

Because I felt it was a possibility. It’s a possibility for every woman and I just, I think if I found a lump it would take me longer to go to the doctor, because of the fear. And it was much better going and getting it seen to early on. So I was delighted when I reached fifty to have that done.

Were you expecting the letter;

Yes. And in fact, I think it was just after my, it must have been about six or seven months after my fiftieth birthday so I sort of was a bit annoyed they didn’t see me straight away, but obviously they saw me in time.

Well I’ve always gone for my cervical smear and I always thought it would be better to be safe than sorry. And I just thought no, I didn’t have any problems going because I just thought this is for me. In fact my father, who has passed away, was a doctor and my brother’s a doctor so were kind of felt, you know I’ll do the right thing medical-wise [laughs]. So I wanted to keep it up, I just wanted to do exactly the right thing. There was no question of not going.