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Karen Coningham was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer after putting off getting a mammogram for five years.

“I think,like with a lot of things,the more you put it off,time goes by and you don’t realise how much time has gone by.”

The 61-year-old had felt a lump in her breast but assumed it was a benign cyst. When she finally went and got a scan in early 2020,five years after her last scan,she got the life-changing news that she had stage 4 breast cancer.

Even worse,it had metastasised to her bones and lymph nodes,meaning it was now inoperable – she would have to take medication to keep it in check for the rest of her life.

“The type of cancer I have is hormone receptor positive breast cancer,so I’m being treated with medication,which keeps it in check,” Coningham said.

“If I had got in much earlier,it might have been caught and I might have had to have a much more invasive treatment,but that would have been an end to it. Now there’s not.”

Screening for all types of cancers declined during the pandemic,but doctors at Brisbane’s Mater Hospital have raised fresh concerns after they also fell this year compared to the same period last year.

Mater specialist breast surgeon Dr Ben Lancashire said there was a 16 per cent decline in the number of Queensland women getting breast screens in the first three months of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021.

“That’s a significant reduction – it’s about 10,700 fewer mammograms – and it’s very difficult to explain,” he said.

“You would think coming out of the pandemic,you would see an increase in those numbers,so the downturn is concerning.”

Queensland’s drop in breast screens was much more substantial than the rest of the country,according to the latest data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare,which showed nationwide,there was a total drop of 2.5 per cent – equal to about 7500 mammograms – when comparing the same periods.

Lancashire said a possible explanation was the stress being felt by the hospital system at the start of 2022 during the initial Omicron wave,which might have created logjams in schedules due to staff being off sick.

But he said whatever the cause,it was a trend that needed to be reversed,as early detection was crucial for the treatment of all cancers – especially breast cancer.

“There are excellent treatments now for a wide range of breast cancers,but early detection is still the best thing,” he said.

“The five-year survival rate for breast cancer is now the best it has ever been,and a lot of that is attributed to early detection from these screening programs,so we can’t afford to let this slide.”

Coningham said she was getting great support from family and friends for her ongoing treatment,but added that people should support each other to go and get screened.

“Sometimes all you need is a friend or a relative to nag you to go,especially if you’re a procrastinator like me,” she said.

“I’ve heard of groups of friends who make it a coffee date,they all get mammograms and then coffee after,which is a wonderful idea.”

It’s estimated that more than 20,000 women and 200 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer in Australia in 2022,while more than 3200 Australians will die from breast cancer this year.

Patients diagnosed with breast cancer currently have a 92 per cent chance of surviving five or more years after diagnosis,which rises to 96 per cent if the cancer is detected before it spreads outside the breast tissue.

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