Not All Breasts are the Same Early Cancer Detection for Women with Dense Breasts May Be Much More Effective with Advanced Supplemental Screening
by Ed Renouard Director of Marketing, Inland Imaging
H
aving dense breasts is normal — it simply means your breasts contain more fibroglandular tissue than fat. But when it comes to the early detection of breast cancer, women with dense breasts sometimes require supplemental screening in addition to an annual mammogram.
What Are Dense Breasts? Breast density is a description of how your breast appears on a mammogram and is determined by the radiologist reading your exam. When evaluating mammography images, fibrous and glandular tissue appears white and fatty tissue looks black. A dense breast contains mostly white fibro-glandular tissue—which can make it much more difficult to detect possible cancers. There are four categories of breast density on a mammogram: • Almost entirely fatty • Scattered areas of fibroglandular density • Heterogeneously (varyingly) dense • Extremely dense Women with mammograms that are heterogeneously dense or extremely dense are considered to have “dense breasts”. Breast density may decrease with age, but for most women there is little change over time. Dense breast tissue along with a number of other factors may place a woman at increased breast cancer risk. Those factors include family history, previous medical history and treatment, environmental and lifestyle factors, and genetics.
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