Patent ID: 6999553

Claim:
In a method of X-ray mammography imaging of a breast at an imaging area, the breast having posterior tissue located at the chest wall and a middle and anterior tissue compressed between a paddle and bucky assembly on opposite sides of the breast, the method comprising: displacing the paddle and bucky assembly relative to one another in the vertical direction to compress the posterior breast tissue at the chest wall in the vertical direction only without pushing posterior tissue at the chest wall away from the chest wall or into the chest wall and from the imaging area; stopping this vertical displacement prior to compressing the anterior and middle breast portions sufficiently for imaging and in order to lessen the patient's discomfiture with further stretching of the posterior skin of the breast at a chest wall of the patient; subsequently, in time, using an inclined surface on the paddle or bucky to compress the middle and anterior breast tissue with a second force which is at an angle to the first vertical force and which has a horizontal force component which is lesser than the first vertical force to prevent the anterior or middle breast tissue from pushing the posterior breast tissue toward the chest wall and from the imaging area; imaging the compressed posterior, middle and anterior breast tissue; using the paddle which has a fixed rigid section, which is X-ray transparent and which extends horizontally from the chest wall and which is positionable against the posterior breast tissue adjacent the chest wall to compress the posterior tissue to limit pushing of posterior breast tissue from the imaging area; and flexing an inclined section of the paddle joined at an outer end of the fixed rigid section to apply the subsequent second force through an inclined surface on the inclined section to compress the middle and anterior areas of the breast.