Poster Presentation Women's Health Forum 2021

Facts and issues around mammographic / breast density (#36)

Erik (Rik) W Thompson 1 2 3 , Susan Fraser 3 4 , Haitham Tuffaha 3 5
  1. School of Biomedical Science, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
  2. Translational Research Institute, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
  3. Clinical Oncology Society of Australia, Sydney, NSW, Australia
  4. Cairns Breast Surgical Outpatients Department, Cairns Hospital , Cairns, QLD, Australia
  5. Centre for the Business and Economics of Health, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

Under the auspices of COSA (Clinical Oncology Society of Australia), we recently developed a Fact and Issues Sheet on Mammographic / Breast Density (1). Although primarily targeted towards the professional groups represented by COSA and other health professionals to help ensure they are well informed of the current issues surrounding high breast density in Australia, the findings are of interest to the community in general. The key points highlighted by the document include:

(i) The benefits of continued mammography screening irrespective of density score

(ii) The importance of considering mammographic density-associated risk in the context of overall risk of an individual women, due to other factors

(iii) The complexities of providing breast density information and supplementary screening, which require careful explanation, and still may cause anxiety 

(iv) The need for further research and important ongoing studies and clinical trials.

These finding will be presented and discussed.

We acknowledge significant input from a stakeholder working group comprising Paul Grogan (Cancer Australia and NSW Cancer Council), John Hopper (University of Melbourne), Wendy Ingman (University of Adelaide and The Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Adelaide), Gillian Lamoury (RANZCR), Bruce Mann (University of Melbourne and Breast Cancer Trials), Danielle Mazza (Primary Care Collaborative Cancer Clinical Trials Group (PC4), Vicki Pridmore (BreastScreen Victoria), Michelle Reintals (Breastscreen South Australia), Christobel Saunders (University of WA), Danielle Spence (BCNA and Cancer Council Victoria), Jennifer Stone (University of WA). We also sought input from BreastScreen Australia, BCNA, Pink Hope and inforMD (2).

  1. https://www.cosa.org.au/media/332779/breast_density_facts_issues_final_approved_5march2021.pdf
  2. https://www.informd.org.au/