COUNTY Durham women are set to benefit from a new mobile breast screening trailer.
The trailer, which will be introduced by Gateshead Health Trust next month, will tour parts of County Durham and South Tyneside.
One trailer has already come into service in the grounds of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead.
The trailers were bought with £300,000 from the National Lottery's New Opportunities Fund.
Gateshead Health Trust's clinical director and programme manager, Dr Richard Young, said: "We were all excited by the success of our bid to the New Opportunities Fund for replacement equipment for our breast screening programme.
"The size of the award was surprising but it has allowed us to replace our aged mobile screening vans, our obsolete ultrasound machine and our out-of-date assessment x-ray equipment.
"All of the women from Sunderland, Durham, Gateshead and South Tyneside will benefit from this injection of resources.''
One in 12 women develop breast cancer but early detection through screening means the disease is much easier to treat and is caught before it spreads to other parts of the body.
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