Women who have been diagnosed with breast cancer in one breast have a higher risk of contracting the disease in their opposite breast as well. A thorough examination of the opposite breast using mammography and ultrasound is therefore common practice. However, many tumours still remain undetected when using mammography. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) promises better results, as is shown in an inter-national study involving the University of Bonn. In almost 1,000 women with a recent diagnosis of breast cancer in one breast, MRI helped identify 30 cancers in the seemingly normal opposite breast . In women with a normal (negative) MRI of the opposite breast, there was a 99.6% confidence that in fact no breast cancer was present -- which means that if the MRI study is normal, preventive mastectomy of the opposite breast, which some women want, is definitely unnecessary . These findings have now been published in the prestigious journal “New England Journal of Medicine.”>>> Discuss This Story
