Study: MRIs Better Than Mammograms for High-Risk Women

MRIs may be a better screening method than mammograms for women with breast cancer in their family history or otherwise genetically predisposed to the disease, according to European researchers.

Reporting at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, researchers said two studies comparing the screening methods in high-risk women found MRIs twice as sensitive as a mammogram in identifying early breast cancer.

In the German study, 45 patients out of 462 developed breast cancer over a five-year period. MRI scans detected 96.1 percent of the tumors, compared to 42.8 percent detected by mammograms.

"We were picking up very small lesions," said Dr. Christiane Kuhl, associate professor of radiology at the University of Bonn and lead author of the German study.

A Dutch multicenter study found that MRIs detected 71 of the tumors compared to 36 percent detected by mammograms.

Jan G.M. Klijn of Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, one of the researchers, said MRIs would be useful in picking up aggressive cancers found in some women.

"We recommend the routine use of MRI in addition to mammography especially in women with proven gene mutations because these women generally develop rapidly growing tumours and show the lowest sensitivity to mammography because of their young age and dense breast tissue," Klijn said.

Other Sources: ASCO