[[{“type”:“media”,“view_mode”:“media_large”,“fid”:null,“attributes”:{“class”:“media-image alignright size-full wp-image-1604”,“typeof”:“foaf:Image”,“style”:“”,“width”:“100”,“height”:“100”,“title”:“”,“alt”:“Los Angeles Times”}}]]The Los Angeles Times reports that about one-third of all tumors discovered in routine mammography screenings are unlikely to result in illness, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The study, co-authored by H. Gilbert Welch, a professor of medicine at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice, says that 30 years of the breast cancer exams have resulted in the overdiagnosis of 1.3 million American women, the newspaper reports.

“Our study raises serious questions about the value of screening mammography,” Welch writes in the study. “It clarifies that the benefit of mortality reduction is probably smaller, and the harm of overdiagnosis probably larger, than has been previously recognized.”

Read the full story, published 11/22/12 in the Los Angeles Times.