Abstract
Background
Breast cancer in women is a major public health problem throughout the world, being the second most common cancer worldwide. Sonomammography has been always recommended as the basic breast imaging modality for early detection and diagnosis of breast cancer. Some malignant tumors have been missed, specially in dense breasts, and high false-negative rate have been reported. Contrast enhanced spectral mammography is a new modality, used to depict the tumor vascularity and neoangiogenesis; a classic sign of malignant tumors.
Aim of Work
The purpose of this study is to determine the added value of dual energy contrast mammography to sono-mammography in the assessment of suspicious breast lesions.
Patients and Methods
36 patients were included in the study, referred from outpatient clinics in private settings and from Demerdash Hospitals. Contrast enhanced spectral mammography CESM was performed by using a digital mammography unit (Seno DS; GE, Buc, France) that had been adapted to obtain two images for each view: a low-energy image (below the k edge of iodine, 33.2 keV) and a high-energy image (above the k edge of iodine) at 45 to 49 kVp.
Results: CEDM versus sonomammography shows p (0.021) value less than 0.05. Also the area under the ROC curve was higher for MX+CEDM (94.4%) than that was for sonomammography (63.8%) compared to pathology analysis with 100% sensitivity, 88.2 % specificity, 90.48 %PPV and 100 % NPV in diagnosis of suspicious lesions.
Conclusion
The diagnostic accuracy of CEDM+ MX for the detection of breast carcinoma has proven to be superior to sonomammography alone. CEDM had a better diagnostic accuracy mainly due to improved positive and negative predictive values (Positive predictive value about 90.48, negative predictive value 100). The role of CEDM in detection of multifocal / multicentric carcinomas with particular interest for the assessment of the extent of disease specially in dense breasts is appreciated.