Breast screening in the UK
Expert warns that breast screening across the country needs to undergo a dramatic transformation over the next 15 years, Mark Nicholls reports.
Breast cancer
Trivialising breast cancer kills women
‘As we become more successful in the early detection and treatment of breast cancer, we tend to trivialise it. Yet one in 9 women still get breast cancer. Half of them become depressed, their partners don’t know how to react and their families are in disarray. We need to stop trivialising breast cancer. It kills women.’ So says Dr Fabienne Liebens, Head of the Saint-Pierre Hospital’s…
3-D mammography: Utilising eye to brain characteristics
Films with vivid 3-D images draw millions to cinemas – regardless of the plot. This technology, which is based on a stereoscopic effect, is not only entertaining but also medically relevant, as demonstrated by the Amulet three-dimensional digital mammography system produced by Fujifilm.
Breast screening administration - Denmark’s web-based portal
The daily management of around 700 examinations within the national mammography screening programme keeps Dr Ilse Vejborg and her team at Rigshospitalet pretty busy. ‘We have the largest screening unit in Denmark with 200,000 women aged 50-69 years in the target group invited for an examination every second year,’ she explains.
Sectra and Philips complete modality transaction
Sectra has completed a mammography-modality deal with Royal Philips Electronics. Philips will pay EUR 57.5 million in a cash-on-cash and debt-free basis and take over the acquired modality operation today, September 1, 2011.
Fusion and Fly Thru - the new Aplio 500
Catastrophes draw people closer, as demonstrated by the development of the new high-end ultrasound scanner Aplio 500 from Toshiba. The clinical evaluation period took place during the tsunami and the nuclear catastrophe in Fukusima. Professor Thomas Fischer at the Radiological Institute, Charité Clinic in Berlin, was impressed by the enormous commitment shown by the Japanese firm’s engineers…
Elastography in breast ultrasound
In recent years, the technique of breast ultra-sonography has become an essential procedure in the diagnostic evaluation of breast tissue. The improvement of ultrasound technology, especially with regards to the high resolution of modern devices and the use of colour Doppler sonography, has made this technique indispensable in our daily routine. Although the value of conventional breast…
From punch to vacuum to RF-guided breast intervention with ultrasound
More than 90% of patients who present with suspect or highly suspect breast lesions (BI-RADS categories 4 or 5) now undergo biopsies. Further treatment is only carried out after the precise histological clarification of the tissue sample is obtained. The intervention is routinely carried out via ultrasound guided punch biopsy. Thanks to new techniques the procedure is now becoming even more…
The breast ultrasound Champion League
Since 1991 the International Breast Ultrasound School (IBUS) has indefatigably promoted progress and quality assurance in breast ultrasound -- a good reason for IBUS to celebrate its 20th anniversary during WFUMB.
How Breast Cancer Spreads And New Ways To Treat It
Research into new methods to prevent and slow metastatic breast cancer will be presented this week at the Era of Hope conference, a scientific meeting hosted by the Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Program (BCRP).
31st German Senology Congress - More opportunities in breast diagnostics
Yes, it’s in beautiful Dresden again and -- as in 2006 when the city last hosted the Congress of the German Society for Senology -- this year’s Congress President is Professor Rüdiger Schulz-Wendtland (Department of Radiology, University of Erlangen). However, the repetition ends there; the congress topics will be anything but repeated. Report: Meike Lerner
Hitachi Realtime Tissue Elastography (HI-RTE) with HI VISION Ascendus
HI-RTE allows the assessment and real-time colour display of tissue elasticity. The current generation ultrasound modality has proven applications in breast, prostate, thyroid and pancreatic disease and where diagnostic biopsy is indicated, HI-RTE allows more accurate localization and targeting of lesions.
Positron emission mammography is coming to Europe
Every medical congress is an opportunity for the manufacturers to showcase their products. This year’s congress of the German Röntgen Society was no exception -- and one innovation particularly caught the attention of our European Hospital team: positron emission mammography, PEM for short.
Could high coffee intake cut breast cancer risk?
Oestrogen receptor (ER)-negative breast cancer, remains hard to treat despite major advances in surgery and adjuvant therapies. The latest results from a Swedish study [Pub: Breast Cancer Res. 2011 May 14;13(3):R49] suggest that a high daily intake of coffee -- more than five cups -- is associated with a statistically significant decrease in ER-negative breast cancer among postmenopausal women…
Shining green - Seeing is believing
Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer in women. Evaluation of the axillary lymph nodes is essential to insure complete cancer removal. Fluorescence imaging instead of radioisotopes is an innovative method for sentinel lymph node detection.
High hopes for elastography
Dr Bill Svensson believes that elastography has the potential to improve diagnosis of breast cancer, reduce the number of false positives in the detection of the condition and also lead to fewer biopsies performed as accuracy of imaging improves further. This June he highlighted the potential of elastography and the developments in the imaging modality at two sessions at the United Kingdom…
Article • DNA
A genomic test to predict chemotherapy outcomes
Although powerful, new, targeted treatments are regularly introduced to cancer clinics, choices for the first-line treatment of invasive breast cancer normally lie between preventive surgery and chemotherapy. A recent American study used genomic prediction combining multiple signatures to determine outcomes to standard chemotherapy.
Hologic Selenia receives EUREF certification
Hologic announced today that its Selenia Dimensions digital mammography system in two dimensional (2D) mode has been awarded “EUREF Type Test” certification by the European Reference Organization (EUREF) Council for Quality Assured Breast Screening and Diagnostic Services.
Changing places - but not that fine-tuned focus
From first lady of breast MRI to the Germany’s most influential woman in radiology – that’s one way to describe Professor Christiane Kuhl’s switch from being Vice-Chairman of the Department of Radiology and Vice President of the University of Bonn to become Chairman of the Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology at the University Hospital Aachen (UKA).
Mammography or MRI: what will breast imaging look like in the not so distant future?
Mammography is the most widely used modality for early detection of breast cancer, the leading cause of cancer death in women worldwide. But its limitations, such as the high number of false positives it creates, have led researchers to focus on different strategies to characterize breast carcinomas more accurately, such as tomography, MRI and molecular imaging. In a new horizons session today at…
What do women know about early detection of breast cancer?
Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women in Europe: each year 350,000 new cases are diagnosed and each year about 130,000 women die of the disease. At the same time breast cancer is one of the few cancer types with encouraging healing prospects – if detected early.
ShearWave Elastography enters new applications and medical fields
In 2005, when they founded the French ultrasound company SuperSonic Imagine, Jacques Souquet PhD and Claude Cohen-Bacrie had to convince radiologists that they not only offered a new product but also a completely new ultrasound technology that could measure entirely new parameters.
Giotto - The Italian route towards digital breast tomosynthesis
It’s digital mammography taken to the next level – or, so to speak, the next dimension as digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) that provides high resolution 3-D imaging. For about two years this exciting technology has promised to become the magic bullet in the early detection of breast cancer, particularly in the dense breast.
Sectra - Confident and able to count on its photon counting technology
SECure TRAnsmission, the main aim of a spin-off from the Linköping Institute of Technology, was established in 1978. From this beginning, the Swedish firm Sectra has evolved into one of the world’s leading players in PACS and mammography solutions. Although secure communication systems remains a core business, the medical section has constantly grown since 1988, when Dr Torbjörn Kronander…
Towards customised treatment of breast cancer
Breast cancer can develop very differently in different women. Researchers in Norway are improving breast cancer diagnostics and treatment by identifying the various tumour types. The objective is to find out as much as possible about the various tumour types so that each patient can receive precisely the right treatment at the right time.