Washington, Sept 29 : A three-year study has revealed that the adding ultrasound to mammography can help find more cancers than mammography alone. However, the procedure also substantially increases the number of false positives.

The study, which was presented on September 28 at the American College of Radiology’s fall meeting in Washington, D.C., was conducted by Wendie A. Berg, M.D., Ph.D., of American Radiology Services.

Co-author on the study was Etta Pisano, M.D., vice dean for academic affairs in the University of North Carolina, Kenan professor of radiology and biomedical engineering and director of the UNC Biomedical Research Imaging Center.

Based on their study the researchers said that it was difficult to say whether using ultrasound would be worth the effort.

“At this point, it’s not clear whether the benefit provided by ultrasound outweighs the additional expense, stress and inconvenience caused by the false positives. We know that ultrasound does find more cancers. The question is, does it find enough more cancers to make it worthwhile"” Pisano said.

For the study 2,637 women were examined who were at a high risk for breast cancer. They received both mammography and ultrasound exams by physicians who received special training in breast ultrasound screening.

By one or both of the tests it was found that 40 women had 41 breast cancers of which 12 of the cancers were found by ultrasound alone.

Addition of ultrasound resulted in 136 (5.2 percent) women having biopsies due to suspicion of cancer. Of these women, 14 or 8.5 percent were diagnosed with breast cancer.

Based on the results, the researchers concluded that adding ultrasound to mammography would find approximately an additional one to seven cancers per 1,000 high-risk women who had not previously been screened by ultrasound.

But it would also substantially increase the number of false positives.

“We had hoped to see a bigger effect of ultrasound compared to mammography, but I think these results show it’s a mixed picture at this point” Pisano said. (With inputs from ANI)