The number of women who opted for mastectomy when diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer increased significantly at the same time MRI screening before surgery doubled, a new study finds.
Research from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., shows that mastectomy rates for early-stage breast cancer dropped between 1997 and 2004, and then jumped between 2003 and 2006 — a time when MRI use also increased dramatically.
Researchers tracked 5,414 women who had surgery for early breast cancer between 1997 and 2006. They discovered that the mastectomy rate fell to 30 per cent in 2003 from 44 per cent in 1997.
However, by 2006, the mastectomy rate had risen to 44 per cent. In the same period, 2003-2006, the percentage of women who had MRI grew to 23 per cent in 2006 from 11 per cent in 2003.
Fifty-two per cent of women who had a pre-surgical MRI chose a mastectomy versus 41 per cent of women who did not have MRI.
The researchers believe an MRI, which is very effective at differentiating between benign and cancerous tumours, prompts women to undergo the more radical surgery. They’re not sure why.
Detection or uncertainty?
“What we don’t know from this study is whether the higher rate of mastectomy observed in our patients undergoing MRI is related to the detection of additional disease, or whether the uncertainty raised by MRI leads to greater anxiety for the patient and physician, thus leading patients and physicians to choose mastectomy over lumpectomy,” says Matthew Goetz, the study’s senior author, in a release.
The researchers stress that although MRIs and mastectomies seem related, the study cannot prove a cause and effect relationship. They suggest the individual choices of women with early-stage breast cancer be further explored.
Traditionally, breast-conserving surgery such as lumpectomy has been the standard of care for early-stage breast cancer.
The study’s results will be presented May 31 at the 44th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
