New diagnostic developments to prevent unnecessary invasive procedures in breast cancer diagnostic work-up

PhD ceremony: Ms. M.D. Dorrius, 13.15 uur, Academiegebouw, Broerstraat 5, Groningen

Dissertation: New diagnostic developments to prevent unnecessary invasive procedures in breast cancer diagnostic work-up

Promotor(s): prof. M. Oudkerk

Faculty: Medical Sciences

Mammography is the primary imaging modality for early detection of breast cancer. Limitations arise when interpretations are ambiguous and a biopsy is required. The focus of this PhD research is to prevent unnecessary invasive procedures in breast cancer diagnosis for women with a probably benign (BI-RADS-3) breast lesion. The probability of such lesions being cancer is less than 2%. Breast-MRI can provide a sufficiently high negative predictive value (>98%) and thereby rule out malignancy in a majority of patients (68%) with non-calcified mammographic BI-RADS-3 lesions. A state of the art Computer Aided Detection system for breast-MRI evaluations was expected to identify almost all non-calcified lesions susceptible of cancer, but was found to add little to the accuracy of an experienced radiologist. Furthermore, a short, non-invasive quantitative multivoxel MR-spectroscopy was found to increase the accuracy of breast-MRI.