Southwest Memorial Hospital has passed its 35th FDA Mammography Quality Standards Act inspection without deficiencies, spokeswoman Haley Saunders said in a press release.

“Our dedicated team of professionals goes above and beyond to meet requirements in order to give the best care possible to Montezuma County.” Saunders said. “The inspector stated ‘that our community should be proud of the program that we have here at Southwest Health System.’”

Southwest also has passed a special registry examination given by the American Registry of Radiologic Technologists, Saunders said.

Southwest is home to 3D mammography, also referred to as Digital Breast Tomosynthesis or tomo, one of the latest technological innovations in women’s health care. It enables images of the whole breast to be taken in slices, and then reconstructed in 3D.

“This helps to enable doctors to see all around and between the breast tissues to help perform an accurate analysis and search for possible abnormalities,” Saunders said.

During a 3D mammography, the X-ray tube will move to capture multiple images of the breast from different angles. It takes about the same amount of time as a regular 2D mammogram, Saunders said.

A 3D mammography also sees behind normal breast tissue, where abnormalities could hide in 2D images.

Southwest Health System uses GE Healthcare’s SenoClaire technology to deliver 3D mammograms.

This article was reposted on Aug. to correct that Southwest Memorial Hospital passed mammography inspection, without deficiencies,