New Breast Scan Doesn't Squeeze

Surely, every woman who has ever had her breasts squeezed between two plastic plates during a mammography has thought, "There's got to be a better way."

There just might be.

An ongoing study being conducted by physicians at the University of Rochester and the Elizabeth Wende Breast Clinic is showing promise for a new technology called Cone Beam Breast Computed Tomography.


So far, the technique has produced breast images that are just as good as — and in some cases, better than —those taken with mammography with a similar X-ray dose but without the need for any uncomfortable squeezing.

And while it may not initially replace mammography altogether, it could add another layer of confidence to diagnosing suspicious abnormalities in the breast.

"We think at least 15 percent of cancers can't be diagnosed because they are hiding," said physician Avice O'Connell, director of women's imaging at the University of Rochester's Medical Center, co-author in the study.

That may be part of the reason why breast cancer remains the biggest cancer killer of women, after lung cancer, with 270,000 cases diagnosed and 40,000 deaths annually in the United States alone.

Finding diseased tissue is a challenge because each woman's breast differs in tissue composition. For example, cancer is somewhat easier to spot in breasts with lots of fatty tissue and more difficult to spot in breasts that have less fat and more of the fibrous glandular tissue that produces milk.

If a woman has a mammogram and the clinician spots something suspicious, the patient may be asked to undergo an ultrasound and then a biopsy.

In at least 75 to 80 percent of the cases, the suspicious masses turn out to be nothing to worry about, said Daniel Kopans, professor of radiology and director of breast imaging at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Kopans is not associated with the study.

On the other side of the coin, even the best mammographers under the best conditions will miss 15 percent of tumors, said O'Connell.

"It's like trying to find a snowman in a snowstorm," she said. "You can't see it until you come up close to it."

Cone Beam CT has the potential to significantly improve diagnosis.

by: Tracy Staedter, Discovery News