Kathy Kaufield has notched another victory. The former Stratford, P.E.I., resident started a social media campaign, #TellMe, to press political leaders to provide women with information about their breast density after receiving mammograms.

FREDERICTON — A breast cancer survivor and advocate had a sweet victory Friday: She saw the two leading parties adopt her cause as platform planks for the Sept. 24 New Brunswick election. “I’m dancing a happy dance,” Kathy Kaufield said after both the Liberals and Progressive Conservatives pledged Friday to ensure women are given information on their breast density following mammograms.

Studies show the denser the breast, the greater the chance of developing cancer. The Liberals and Progressive Conservatives are promising to give women potentially life-saving information in the form of an additional line about breast density on their mammogram reports.

Dense breast tissue can obscure cancer on a mammogram image. Kathy Kaufield was given the all-clear following her regular mammogram screening in June 2015. Six months later she discovered the lump. She found it on her own by chance in a Saint Andrews hotel in November of that year after forgetting to pack her shower puff. While cleaning by hand, she felt the growth.

The idea is to use the technology instead of relying on a radiologist’s eyes because, like cancer, dense breast tissue appears white in mammograms, making it difficult for radiologists to see. A woman with dense breasts also has more dense tissue than fatty, and that means her chances of getting cancer are higher.

It turns out that I am one of the nearly three million Canadian women over the age of 40 who have dense breasts. The letter did not tell me that. Nor did it tell me that because I have dense breasts, I have a higher chance of developing breast cancer and that it will be harder to detect on a mammogram. Mammograms miss more than 50 per cent of the cancers in the densest breasts.

Advocates are taking aim at Nova Scotia’s “negligence” around failing to inform women of a breast cancer screening risk factor they say could save lives.

When Naomi Pickersgill was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014, it was a shock. Just 35 days earlier, a mammogram scan of her breasts had come back normal.