Fremont hospital's equipment offers quicker mammograms.(Knight Ridder Newspapers)

SAN JOSE, Calif. _ Fremont's Washington Hospital has become one of the few medical facilities that use a new technology that performs a breast examination in half the time of other systems.

Washington is the only hospital in the East Bay, and the only one from Redding to Fresno, that offers the faster digital mammography. The $1 million GE Medical System Senographe 2000D is one of only 300 systems worldwide.

"The mammogram is done exactly the same way, but now instead of taking the film to a processing center, it's taken digitally," said Dr. Mimi Lin, director of mammography at Washington Hospital. "You can see the images right away."

In the ...