Breast Cancer Test & Diagnosis: Ultrasound Better at Detecting Invasive, Without Calcifications

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A recent study said that ultrasound is equally effective as mammography in diagnosing breast cancer.

Many people would find the study very helpful, especially for women who are living in countries that have limited access to mammography. There are places in this world wherein patients and even doctors alike do not have that much option but to use an ultrasound machine when it comes to detecting a disease like breast cancer.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stated that breast cancer is said to be the most common cancer in the world among women. The disease claimed 522,000 lives around the globe in the year 2012.

While the team of researchers finds in their new study that ultrasound is reliable, they also said that ultrasound diagnosis should not necessarily replace mammography.

The data was collated after the researchers examined the records of 2,809 women from U.S., Argentina and Canada. They found out in their records that these women have dense breasts, with another risk factor in having breast cancer.

As stated in the report by The Journal of the National Cancer Institute, in a span of three years, each of the woman included in the research had three mammography and ultrasonography screening.

It was determined that mammography was better at detecting cancers with calcifications, which is said to have the characteristic of the most common form of breast cancer, DCIS or ductal carcinoma in situ. Although non-invasive, DCIS has all the possibility to spread and eventually become invasive. Nevertheless, many doctors and researchers are saying that DCIS is not life-threatening.

Meanwhile, ultrasound was much better at picking up the disease without calcifications and the invasive cancers, which is said to be more dangerous, according to Wendie Berg, the lead author and a doctor at Womens Hospital of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

In the study, 80 percent of the 111 breast cancers that were found are invasive. Both mammography and ultrasonography have identified almost the same number of patients with cancers.

According to a report from Healthline, the new findings will definitely help patients who do not have the resources to fund their treatment. Since ultrasound is cheaper compared to mammography, this will give them option to go through ultrasonography with the same reliability as ultrasonography.

"Where mammography is available, ultrasound should be seen as a supplemental test for women with dense breasts who do not meet high-risk criteria for screening MRI and for high-risk women with dense breasts who are unable to tolerate MRI," Dr. Berg said in a statement.