Methods for early detection - a study

kaywrite

This article helped me formulate questions for my surgeon, and find out what kind of imaging I'd had done prior to surgery. Hope this is helpful.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4690445/

Breast MRI vs Digital Mammogram vs Breast Tomosynthesis (DBT)

"Our study shows that DBT performs better in detection and characterization of breast lesions compared to DM and breast MRI."

Bosombuddy101

Thanks for sharing this. The radiation dose for a single view with DBT compared to traditional digital mammogram is far greater as per the study below.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28819862

Radiation dose with digital breast tomosynthesis compared to digital mammography: per-view analysis.

Gennaro G1, Bernardi D2, Houssami N3.

Author information

Abstract

OBJECTIVES:

To compare radiation dose delivered by digital mammography (FFDM) and breast tomosynthesis (DBT) for a single view.

METHODS:

4,780 FFDM and 4,798 DBT images from 1,208 women enrolled in a screening trial were used to ground dose comparison. Raw images were processed by an automatic software to determine volumetric breast density (VBD) and were used together with exposure data to compute the mean glandular dose (MGD) according to Dance's model. DBT and FFDM were compared in terms of operation of the automatic exposure control (AEC) and MGD level.

RESULTS:

Statistically significant differences were found between FFDM and DBT MGDs for all views (CC: MGDFFDM=1.366 mGy, MGDDBT=1.858 mGy; p<0.0001; MLO: MGDFFDM=1.374 mGy, MGDDBT=1.877 mGy; p<0.0001). Considering the 4,768 paired views, Bland-Altman analysis showed that the average increase of DBT dose compared to FFDM is 38 %, and a range between 0 % and 75 %.

CONCLUSIONS:

Our findings show a modest increase of radiation dose to the breast by tomosynthesis compared to FFDM. Given the emerging role of DBT, its use in conjunction with synthetic 2D images should not be deterred by concerns regarding radiation burden, and should draw on evidence of potential clinical benefit.

KEY POINTS:

• Most studies compared tomosynthesis in combination with mammography vs. mammography alone. • There is some concern about the dose increase with tomosynthesis. • Clinical data show a small increase in radiation dose with tomosynthesis. • Synthetic 2D images from tomosynthesis at zero dose reduce potential harm. • The small dose increase should not be a barrier to use of tomosynthesis.