RONAN — A $3,000 grant from the Plum Creek Foundation will help ensure that women get the mammograms they need for early detection of breast cancer.

St. Luke Community Healthcare Foundation is to purchase a Selenia Digital Mammography Machine, which produces images that are clearer and more detailed than traditional mammography equipment. The Plum Creek grant will go toward the purchase.

With the ground-breaking new machine, images can be immediately transmitted electronically through St. Luke Community Hospital’s teleradiology system to radiologists or referring physicians, saving time when an early diagnosis can make a difference in a woman’s life.

“Mammograms are vital to a woman’s health,” Gayle P. Wilhelm, Foundation Executive Director, St. Luke Community Healthcare Foundation said. “They enable health providers to detect masses that cannot be felt, and by this action, they’ve saved countless lives.”

The digital machine is also more user friendly than the hospital’s current equipment, but more importantly, will allow the hospital to reach more women who need the procedure, particularly women without health insurance. For the past six years, the hospital has offered mammograms for uninsured women, and Wilhelm says more women could be helped with the new machine.

“The inclusion of digital mammography will likely increase the number of women who can be served, especially once women realize it is a more comfortable and more accurate means to assess for breast cancer,” she adds.

The project has garnered extensive community support, including donations from hospital supporters, board members and employees.

-Courtesy of Wayne Fuchs