Breast Cancer Screening: We Can Do Better

The three risk assessment tools now in use fall far short. Using the latest deep learning techniques, investigators are developing more personalized ways to locate women at high risk.John Halamka, M.D., president, Mayo Clinic Platform, and Paul Cerrato, senior research analyst and communications specialist, Mayo Clinic Platform, wrote this article.The promise of personalized medicine will eventually allow clinicians to offer individual patients more precise advice on prevention, early detection and treatment. Of course, the operative word iseventually.A closer examination of the screening tools available to detect breast cancer demonstrates that we still have a way to go before we can fulfill that promise. But with the help of better technology, we are getting closer to that realization.Disease screening is about risk assessment. Researchers collect data on thousands of patients who develop breast cancer, for instance, and discover that the age range, family history and menstruation history of those who develop the disease differs significantly from those who remain free of it. That in turn allows policy makers to create a screening protocol that suggests women of a certain age who have experienced early menarche or late menopause are more likely to develop the malignancy. That risk assessment is consistent with the fact that more reproductive years means more exposure to the hormones that contribute to breast cancer. Similarly, there ’s evidence to show that women with fir...
Source: Life as a Healthcare CIO - Category: Information Technology Source Type: blogs