Filiz Demir is blind, but with her hands she can see what doctors sometimes miss under time pressure: the smallest changes in the breast tissue of their patients. If she senses an abnormality with her particularly sensitive and trained fingertips, she will consult a doctor. Using ultrasound or mammography, the doctors can determine if there is a breast cancer.
The Duisburg gynecologist Frank Hoffmann founded the project "Discovering Hands" in 2007. Since then, several women have been trained as so-called medical tactile examiners (MTUs). The idea: with their pronounced sense of touch, trained visually impaired people could recognize even the smallest changes in the breast tissue - possibly even earlier than doctors.
MTUs saw changes as well as doctors
The method has now been tested for its effectiveness for the first time. The result: The MTUs found abnormalities in the tissue as often as a doctor or a doctor in breast cancer screening. "Do both together, they can detect abnormalities in the palpation more often than the doctor alone," says Michael Lux of the Women's Hospital of the University of Erlangen.
He examined the effectiveness of the method in a total of 395 women and published the results in the journal "Breast Care". Especially in women without previous breast surgery, the use has proven, so his conclusion. In 82 percent of these cases, MTUs correctly identified tissue-related tissue abnormalities, with no significant difference to physicians. If the hit accuracy of both combined, it was 89 percent.
"There was greater uncertainty in patients with prior breast surgery," explains Lux. These took up a large part of the sample at the Erlangen Breast Center. "With the often scarred tissue, the buttons were not as clear as the specialized doctors." In everyday practice, however, they could be a useful supplement. Because many gynecologists worked under great time and cost pressure.
No substitute for medical examination
Other doctors are not sure of the method. MTUs achieved similar results to the doctor in just a few minutes with a half-hour investigation, says Sherko Kümmel, Director of the Breast Center at the Essen-Mitte clinics. Although he was glad about the attention for the issue of breast cancer prevention, "but it should not be arousing false hopes that the Tastuntersucherinnen are better than what the medicine has done so far."
"More important for an improvement of the precaution would be, for example, to finance the ultrasound for other risk groups, such as in women with very dense glandular tissue," says caraway. So far, only a few health insurance companies cover such costs. As a rule, mammography is only part of the prescribed catalog of benefits for patients over the age of 50 years.
70,000 new cases per year
With around 70,000 new cases, breast cancer is the most common cancer among women in Germany every year - and also affects younger people. According to the Center for Cancer Registry Data, almost 30 percent of those affected are under 55 years old at diagnosis, an age in which other cancers hardly play a role ,
Even very sensitive fingertips could replace neither the mammography nor the ultrasound, says Tanja Fehm of the University Hospital Dusseldorf and the Association of Gynecological Oncology. She still considers the work of the MTUs to be a valuable additional benefit - "especially for patients who shy away from the often shame-filled breast examination, which makes it easier for some people when blind people take on this important task."
An indication of this was also provided by the current study: Almost all patients stated that they considered the examination as positive and would recommend it. Medic Lux therefore hopes that palpation tests will bring further benefits. For example, if it manages to move women more regularly for early detection.
The 43-year-old Daniela Frankenthal goes for early detection every year. She has been relying on the MTU method for some time, and is being studied by Filiz Demir. Demir's hands migrate centimeter by centimeter from Frankenthal's two breasts. The blind offer two self-adhesive strips of paper. Such a palpation takes at least 30 minutes, the cost of 46.50 euros now take over 26 health insurance nationwide.