State Medical Board Says Arizona Firm Falsely Advertised Breast Cancer Scan
The California Medical Board and San Francisco district attorney filed a joint civil suit Thursday against an Arizona firm that they allege is falsely advertising the effectiveness of a breast cancer scan.
The suit seeks to stop Dr. Craig Bittner, 36, the founder and medical director of Ameri- Scan, from continuing to boast in radio ads and on the Internet that the firm’s “BreastScreen” -- using a technology called magnetic resonance imaging -- is nearly “100% effective” in finding tumors and is more capable than a traditional mammogram.
There is little scientific evidence that an MRI is an effective alternative to a mammogram, said Ron Joseph, executive director of the medical board, which oversees the state’s doctors.
The lawsuit “is really a matter of Bittner’s spreading false information, which could lead people to make poor decisions regarding their own health,” Joseph said.
“Certainly, his ads suggested that mammograms were questionable at best -- therefore you should come get his scan which is 100% accurate. That errs at two extremes.”
Bittner defended his advertisements as truthful and said he was being targeted because the medical establishment is wedded to mammograms -- a cheaper technology that, he said, often misses tumors.
“I’m committed to fighting for women and I’m not going to cower before whatever the medical board or the D.A. might throw at me,” Bittner said. “I’d rather have my license revoked than subject my patients to second-rate medicine.... The medical establishment has come after me to quiet my dissenting voice.”
Bittner’s clinic is in San Jose, but San Francisco Dist. Atty. Terence Hallinan became involved because Bittner’s radio ads air frequently throughout the city and the Bay Area.
Although studies have indicated that MRIs can be useful in detecting breast cancer, there is reluctance by many medical professionals to say that the technology -- or any other diagnostic tool, for that matter -- is 100% effective all of the time.
“We understand the potential value of MRI very well, but we understand its limitations,” said Dr. Robert A. Smith, the national director of screening for the American Cancer Society.
“But at this point in time it must be regarded as an experimental technology for breast imaging.”
An MRI uses magnets and radio waves to build a two- or three-dimensional image of a breast. A mammogram uses low dose X-rays to find abnormal masses in breast tissue.
Smith added that MRIs are best for young women who are at high risk for breast cancer because of known mutations or family histories of cancer. Otherwise, he said, yearly mammograms are still the best tool for cancer detection for adult women.
AmeriScan charges women $2,000 per scan. Its Web site states: “AmeriScan’s revolutionary MRI BreastScreen is so powerful that no woman should suffer or die from this terrible disease. The MRI BreastScreen is so accurate it can help find nearly all breast cancers while they are still in an early, curable stage.”
Bittner said studies in Canada and Germany, among others, have indicated that the MRIs are more than 99% effective in finding breast cancer. He also said that, as far as he knows, his MRIs have not missed diagnosing breast cancer in any of his patients.
