HIGH POINT, N.C. (WGHP) — This week a panel of health experts advised women to begin getting regular mammograms once they turn 40, rather than age 50 as previous recommendations had stated.

This is about catching cancer earlier to improve the chances that treatment will be effective. The US Preventative Service Task Force cited an increase in breast cancer diagnoses among increasingly younger women and the high death rates from breast cancer in the Black community in particular when discussing the need for the change.

Doctor Christine Pestana, a surgical oncologist at Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist and an Assistant Professor of Surgical Oncology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, discusses this change in guidance on this week’s House Call.