Senology-the urgent need for a specialty

Expert physicians from many European and Latin American countries are engaged in a systematic effort to persuade influential colleagues and government officials to recognize senology as a well-defined scientific discipline and establish it as an independent specialty. The task is complex, as the establishment of a new specialty always is. Senology is not a superfluous specialty; it is similar in characteristics and indications to many other single organ-targeted specialties such as cardiology, hematology, nephrology, neurology, and others. The quest for its recognition may be a long effort that will require vigor, intelligence, firmness, persistence, and the establishment of a dialogue between interested physicians and government representatives, leaving personal interests aside. To take the care of patients with breast diseases to its optimal stage, it will be imperative to create specialized breast centers governed by principles of unity of place and action. Gathering under the same roof all specialists skilled and interested in the diagnosis and management of benign and malignant diseases of the breast and all the diagnostic and therapeutic equipment to deliver care to these patients will bring us much closer to our goal.