Adding Breast-Specific Gamma Imaging to Breast Imaging Centers Improves Breast Cancer Detection

According to a new multicenter patient registry’s findings, breast-specific gamma imaging (BSGI), also known as molecular breast imaging (MBI), improves breast cancer detection when added to ultrasound and mammography in the breast-imaging center.

In this study, presented at the US National Consortium of Breast Centers annual meeting, held in Las Vegas, NV, USA, on March 11, 2012, BSGI/MBI detected cancers in nearly 13% of patients with negative or indeterminate mammograms and an unclear diagnostic concern such as subtle changes in the mammogram, breast pain, a new breast lump, and nipple discharge. Another 4% of these patients had a high-risk lesion detected by BSGI/MBI. BSGI performed considerably better than ultrasound, detecting 92% of cancers compared to just 60% by ultrasound.

According to coauthor Dr. Jean Weigert, from Mandell and Blau MDs PC (New Britain, CT, USA), “The primary advantage of ultrasound is that it does not use radiation; however, a negative ultrasound can still miss cancers. Our results demonstrate that in cases where mammography and ultrasound are negative or indeterminate, BSGI can still detect some cancers. The BSGI study does involve low doses of radiation, but the benefit of early cancer detection dwarfs the health risk from the radiation dose. In fact, there has never been a reported health impact from such low radiation doses and the benefit is evident in our data. Even according to the most conservative risk-models, the benefit outweighs the risk 680 to 1.”

As a follow-up to mammography, BSGI/MBI utilizes the Dilon 6800 gamma camera to aid physicians to more noticeably distinguish benign from malignant tissue. To perform BSGI/MBI, the patient receives a pharmaceutical tracing agent that is absorbed by all the cells in the body. Cells in the breast absorb a greater amount of the tracing agent than normal healthy cells because their increased rate of metabolic activity, and typically appear as dark areas on the BSGI/MBI image.

Dilon Diagnostics’ (Newport News, VA, USA), a brand of Dilon Technologies Inc., cornerstone product, the Dilon 6800, is a high-resolution, small field-of-view gamma camera, optimized to perform BSGI/MBI, a molecular breast imaging procedure which images the metabolic activity of breast lesions through radiotracer uptake.

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