The new research focused specifically on associations between background parenchymal enhancement—a known risk factor for breast cancer, visualized on surveillance MRI exams—and secondary breast cancers.

MRI-directed contrast enhanced mammography could serve as a useful stand-alone or complimentary tool for biopsy planning when suspicious lesions are detected. 

The new guidelines put emphasis on the age at which average-risk women should begin annual screening and breast assessments.

Experts found that although abbreviated protocols increased the amount of possible scans per hour from 4.7 to 18.8, non-scanning time rose from 50% to 74%.

A recent analysis of 51 patients revealed that contrast-enhanced mammography and MRI offered comparable assessments of lesion size, and both had similar specificity for pathologic complete response.

In addition to CE-MRI's increased sensitivity for identifying breast cancers, the researchers also found the modality had superior negative likelihood ratios with higher pre-test probabilities for safely ruling out malignancy. 

"The present study validated the feasibility of using MRI-based radiomics to identify a disease prone to missed diagnosis and misdiagnosis," experts involved in the study said.

AI can safely and accurately identify healthy breast tissue on ultrafast breast MRI, negating the need for a radiologist’s closer look and, in the process, lowering cancer screening costs and widening patient access to breast MRI.