MASSDEVICE ON CALL — Researchers at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice criticized popular breast cancer research charity Susan G Komen for the Cure for "misusing statistics to generate false hope" about the benefits of mammogram screenings.

"A growing and increasingly accepted body of evidence shows that although screening may reduce a woman’s chance of dying from breast cancer by a small amount, it also causes major harms," according to the press release. "Yet Komen’s public advertising campaign gives women no sense that screening is a close call."

The study, published this week in the British Medical Journal, accused the group of using messages that are "hopelessly biased" and ignores the harms of overdiagnosis.

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