News

Digital Mammography Trial

Posted on Sep 26, 2005

The American College of Radiology Imaging Network (ACRIN) has completed the largest cancer screening trial in history. The Digital Mammographic Imaging Screening Trial (DMIST) enrolled more than 49,500 women in 35 centers in the United States and Canada four years ago to determine whether digital mammography can detect breast cancer as well as or better than the gold standard of conventional screen-film mammography.

DMIST was launched in October 2001 - at that time, the only full field digital mammography system approved by the Food and Drug Administration was GE Healthcare's Senographe 2000D, and only for clinical use. As a result, the Senographe 2000D is the primary digital mammography technology used in the study.

The patients enrolled in the DMIST at the time of their regular screening mammogram. Each woman was followed for several years after receiving both digital and conventional mammograms. Actual breast cancer status for all participants was determined either through the results of breast biopsy, or as a result of one year of follow-up without clinical evidence of disease.

33 sites participated in the trial, using a total of 35 systems. The breakdown was: 18 GE units, 7 Fischer, 6 Fuji and 6 Hologic.

Today's results prove that the digital mammography screening process is faster and more efficient, reduces X-ray exposure, and picks up breast cancers at an earlier stage than standard mammography technologies. In addition, this study shows that GE's state-of-the-art digital mammograms are more effective in detecting cancers in women with dense breasts and result in fewer women called back for work-up of suspicious breast lesions.

For additional information on this landmark study, please review:

· New England Journal of Medicine
· National Cancer Institute
· American College of Radiology Imaging Network (ACRIN)