The cheap and readily available lidocaine gel, which is a topic anesthetic available over-the-counter, manages to significantly reduce the discomfort and pain associated with mammograms. St. Luke's Mountain States Tumor Institute in Boise, Idaho, studied some 418 women who said that they expected pain and discomfort from their mammograms.

They used over-the-counter painkillers such as Tylenol with or without a gel which was either placebo or lidocaine gel. Oral painkillers did not do any good, but the lidocaine gel made women feel less pain and discomfort when taking a mammogram. The results were published in the July 22 online issue of Radiology and will be printed later this year in the paper version of the journal.

Mammograms are usually painful or at least uncomfortable because breasts are squeezed between two plates in order to maximize the details revealed and chances of detecting abnormal formations, as well as to hold the breast still in order to prevent motion blur. Deodorant, talcum powder or lotion should not be used on breasts prior to a mammography as they may show up as calcium spots on the final X-ray.

According to the American Cancer Society, more than 180,000 American women are diagnosed with breast cancer every year, and almost 41,000 will die because of it. Although death rates from breast cancer have been declining, possibly due to earlier detection and diagnosis, on a national level, breast cancer still represents the second leading cause of cancer death for women.

The accuracy of a diagnostic in reading a mammogram depends on the radiologist’s ability to detect cancer, as a study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute last December suggests. It was found then that the accuracy of detecting cancer ranged from 27 percent to 100 percent and the false-positive rate ranged from zero to 16 percent. The most accurate radiologists were the ones from academic medical centers.