Breast screening (mammography)

• To have screening you have an x-ray of your breast called a mammogram.

• Breast screening is for women between the ages of 50 and 70, it is also for some trans or non-binary people.

• You should get a letter with your results within 2 to 3 weeks. This will tell you what you need to do next.

• There are potential benefits and risks.

Screening aims to find breast cancers early, when they have the best chance of being successfully treated.

• To have screening you have an x-ray of your breast called a mammogram.

• Breast screening is for women between the ages of 50 and 70, it is also for some trans or non-binary people.

• You should get a letter with your results within 2 to 3 weeks. This will tell you what you need to do next.

• There are potential benefits and risks.

Find your local breast screening unit

• England

• Northern Ireland

• Scotland

• Wales

The balance of benefit and harms

An NHS digital report found that more than 20,100 breast cancers were diagnosed through screening in England between 2021 and 2022.

Of those breast cancer cases detected most of these were found at an early stage.

Treatment is likely to be more successful if the cancer is an early stage.

Information for people with learning disabilities

You can watch a video about women with learning disabilities who are going to have breast screening. The video was produced by Avon Breast Screening. It is about 11 minutes long. 

Watch the Avon Breast Screening video for women with learning disabilities

For people with a learning disability NHS England have an easy read leaflet about breast screening as well as links to other resources for those that cannot read.

Go to NHS England easy read guide about breast screening

British Sign Language (BSL) information

There is BSL information about breast screening in the different UK nations. Public Health Wales have 3 BSL videos about breast screening. They are about 35 minutes, 9 minutes and 7 minutes long.

Go to the Public Health Wales BSL videos

NHS information have 2 videos about breast screening in Scotland. These are about 9 minutes and 11 minutes long.

Watch the NHS inform BSL videos about breast screening

The Public Health Agency in Northern Ireland have a British sign language and Irish sign language video. You can find these towards the bottom of the page and are both about 5 minutes long. 

View the HSC British sign language and Irish sign language videos (the links are at the bottom)

JoC's breast cancer story

JoC was diagnosed when she attended a screening appointment. 

"I actually didn't have any idea that I had cancer."

This is JoC's story about her diagnosis and treatment