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WASHINGTON (AP) — New research suggests that automatically giving women with dense breasts extra exams after mammograms isn't necessarily the best way to spot harder to detect cancer.
About 40 percent of women getting mammograms have dense breasts. Dense tissue — milk-producing and connective tissue — appears white. So do potentially cancerous spots, meaning they can blend in.
Laws in 19 states require women to be told if they have dense breasts after a mammogram, with Missouri's and Massachusetts' requirements taking effect in January. Similar legislation has been introduced in Congress.
What's not clear is what a woman who's told her breasts are dense should do next, if anything.
Additional tests would be costly, detect few cancer cases and subject many cancer-free women to unnecessary biopsies.
Scientists are beginning to study if a newer tool, 3-D mammograms, might get around the density problem by essentially viewing breast tissue from more angles.
The research is published in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.
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