Radiologists are always looking for ways to reduce radiation exposure and a recent study shows some promise with the use of digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) and synthesized mammography. Furthermore, the utilization of synthesized mammography pairs with DBT for great success.
The study, “Mounting Evidence for Synthetic Mammography in Breast Cancer Screening,” points out that for the last four decades, mammography has been used in breast cancer screening, yet DBT has been chipping away at traditional mammography technology, becoming a more popular choice. DBT has been the subject of many studies, some finding that with this newer technology, in 1,000 exams, DBT finds around 1.7 more cancers than digital mammography.
The problem is that when comparing new images to old ones, it’s considerably easier to compare the two-dimensional studies than it is DBT results. Also, calcification detection is more difficult with DBT. As for the radiation issue, DBT is often used with digital mammography, which boosts radiation exposure. To get around this issue, there have been efforts to make two-dimensional images from DBT images, resulting in what is being called synthetic mammography (SM).
DBT Improvements
This offers information from the DBT stack, being output on a two-dimensional plane with an SM algorithm. With this new image, healthcare professionals can better see the calcifications and distortions that weren’t as easily seen in a DBT image.
The study shows that when patients (more than 82,000) were screened with synthesized images and DBT, the recall rate was 7%, sensitivity was at 88.3% and specificity was 93.5%, all of which fall into acceptable clinical guidelines.
One of the authors of the report that followed the study said, “if DBT will ultimately be recommended as a new screening modality, the use of synthesized mammography in combination with DBT should be the protocol of choice.”
Cloud-Based Advantages
For access to the latest mammography and DBT technology, look to cloud-based vendors that do all the maintenance and updates. At OffSite Image Management, we’ve developed MAMMO, which is the best viewing technology in the U.S. Our approach is to offer a solution for viewing and processing mammography, ultrasound, CT, MRI and tomosynthesis.
With MAMMO, you get advanced processing features, such as reference lines between MLO and CC images, reference lines between MG and US, tomosynthesis cine + MIP creation and mammography CD support of virtually any vendor.
Get more information about our technology by checking out our MAMMO page.
