Purpose
The usual radiologist practice is not involving facing patients; breast imaging takes exception, its model makes the relationship between radiologist and patient a paramount of the daily routine.
In the “Centro di Senologia della Svizzera Italiana” (CSSI), as in othercomprehensive breast cancer Centers, the radiology department is often the patiententry point. Women can access radiology for screening, diagnosis orsurveillance. In all such differentpathways a biopsy procedure may be requested for the assessment of relevant findings.A previous wide population-based study shown that a breast biopsy procedure...
Methods and materials
A 11-point self-reported questionnaire Fig. 1 Fig. 2 , designed and revised by our internal Quality Control Unit has been administered to patients undergoing any biopsy performed in the breast imaging department of the Centro di Senologia della Svizzera Italiana (CSSI - Lugano) from September 2018 to October 2019, including fine needle, core or vacuum-assisted procedures. Closed- and open-ended questions were written in Italian, the most spoken language in Ticino.
The anonymous survey data were collected and stratified by patient's age, language spoken, preferences about...
Results
Descriptive statistics were performed by reporting answers frequency an N, percentage and median, as appropriate.
66 survey were collected. Patients were all females, median age was 56 (range: 20-92) Fig. 3 ; 60% were married, 15% singles, 11% divorced, 5% widows, 9% did not declared their marital status.
Almost all the patients declared a good understanding of the Italian language, 13.6% were non-native Italian (mainly German mother tongue).
Twenty-eight (43%) patients reported third-level education, 45% declared to have a secondary school education.
59 patients(91%) indicated...
Conclusion
All patients were aware that a radiologist would perform the upcoming invasive procedure.
The radiologist was the medical professional chosen to give the biopsy result from 1/3 to half patients, even not acknowledged to have the confidence of a family doctor or a gynecologist.Patients still prefer to meet the doctor in person, even if they would receive the result as soon as possible.
The non-technical skill of adequate communication should be encouraged to be developed in the curriculum of any breast imaging professional.
This study...
Personal information and conflict of interest
Dr med. V. A. Vitale, EBBI
Consultant radiologist, deputy chief Women's Imaging section
Istituto di Imaging della Svizzera Italiana - IIMSI; Lugano/CH - nothing to disclose
[email protected]
Dr med. C. M. L. Catanese
Consultant radiologist
Istituto di Imaging della Svizzera Italiana - IIMSI; Lugano/CH - nothing to disclose
Dr med. F. Meani
Clinical director
Centro di Senologia della Svizzera Italiana - CSSI; Lugano/CH - nothing to disclose
PD Dr med. F. Del Grande
Head of radiology department,
Istituto di Imaging della Svizzera Italiana - IIMSI;...
References
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Ghosh K, Melton LJ, Suman VJ, et al. Breast Biopsy Utilization: A Population-Based Study. Arch Intern Med. 2005;165(14):1593–1598. doi:10.1001/archinte.165.14.1593
Ciatto, Stefano, Marco Rosselli Del Turco, Antonio Marrazzo, Guido Mazzoleni, Flavia Foglietta, Maria Cristina Cappelli, Alberto Ravaioli, et al. “Time Trends of Benign/Malignant Breast Biopsy Ratios a Multicenter Italian Study.” Tumori...