Starting next month, healthcare providers across the U.S. will be required to notify women with dense breasts of their risk of developing breast cancer (four to six times higher than women with less-dense breasts) as well as screening options besides mammograms.
“If a woman has dense breast tissue, mammography is less effective than it is in a woman without dense breast tissue,” says Dr. Paula George, a radiologist at Midwest Breast Care, part of St. Luke’s Center for Diagnostic Imaging. “However, mammography is still recommended in these women, as many cancers will be detected on mammography, even in dense tissue. This is especially true for malignant microcalcifications, which are much better seen on mammography than ultrasound.”
New technology, such as 3-D mammography or tomosynthesis, provides additional options, says George, adding that the center recently installed the technology. “This increases the cancer-detection rate and decreases the callback rates from screening mammography,” she explains. There’s also breast ultrasound, whether handheld or with the SonoCiné automated whole-breast ultrasound. “Both are effective in dense breast tissue,” says George. Studies have shown that supplementing a mammogram with an ultrasound—which requires no breast compression or injections—can as much as double the likelihood of detecting cancer in dense breasts.
