Keywords:
Breast, Mammography, Screening, Computer Applications-3D, Epidemiology, Tissue characterisation
Authors:
K. H. Ng, Y. W. Liew, K. Rahmat, C. J. Westerhout, Y. C. Teh, N. A. Taib, C. H. Yip; Kuala Lumpur/MY
DOI:
10.1594/ecr2013/C-1843
Purpose
Mammographic breast density is associated with increased risk of breast cancer and a lower probability of detection of cancer.
Malaysia is contemplating a population-based mammographic breast screening program but because of the diversity of ethnic groups and their different breast cancer risk profiles it might be that the screening protocols should be different for each ethnicity,
and yet,
even within each ethnicity it can be expected that there are density variations with age and between women.
Data from the Malaysian National Cancer Registry 2003-2005,
showed that Chinese women had the highest age-standardized rate of breast cancer 59.8 per 100,000,
followed by Indians and Malays (54.1 and 34.9 per 100,000) (1).
Our purpose was to determine the difference in volumetric breast density (VBD) and fibroglandular (FG) volume among the ethnic groups to gain knowledge about optimal screening protocols.