Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2011 Dec 6;9(1):33-40.
doi: 10.1038/nrclinonc.2011.173.

Clinical and epidemiological issues in mammographic density

Valentina Assi  1 , Jane Warwick, Jack Cuzick, Stephen W Duffy
Affiliations
Review

Clinical and epidemiological issues in mammographic density

Valentina Assi et al. Nat Rev Clin Oncol. .

Abstract

High mammographic density is associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, and of all known breast cancer risk factors has the greatest attributable fraction. Mammographic density is estimated to account for 16% of all breast cancers, but can be altered by endogenous and exogenous hormonal factors, and generally declines with age. Confounding factors such as age, parity, menopausal status and BMI make the interpretation of mammographic density particularly challenging. Furthermore, none of the established means of measuring mammographic density are entirely satisfactory because they are time consuming or subjective. It is hoped that by adding information regarding mammographic density to existing models of breast cancer risk assessment, the accuracy of individual risk assessments can be improved. Although mammographic density has clearly been shown to be a powerful factor for predicting the risk of developing breast cancer, its potential role in assessing hormonal preventive regimens and helping to tailor screening algorithms cannot be fully realized until we have more-precise, simple and reproducible density measures.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2002 Nov;11(11):1382-8 - PubMed
    1. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2008 Nov;17(11):3090-7 - PubMed
    1. Breast Cancer Res. 2008;10(4):R64 - PubMed
    1. J Natl Cancer Inst. 2006 Sep 6;98(17):1204-14 - PubMed
    1. Int J Epidemiol. 2000 Aug;29(4):629-36 - PubMed

Publication types