As far as we’ve come in the fight against breast cancer over the past 20 years, the state of actionable information is, circa 2016, fairly accurately encapsulated by an old bromide that’s often dispatched to denigrate perceptions of progress: The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Clinicians evaluating women with nondense breasts who are experiencing focal breast pain will find little to no value adding directed ultrasound to digital mammography when the latter is indicated due to screening scheduling. 

Over the years since the advent of widespread screening mammography, overdiagnosis and overtreatment have become accepted as unfortunate but tolerable collateral troubles. There’s no shortage of literature using mathematical modeling to suggest as much. Now comes a new analysis of hard data, published Oct. 13 in the New England Journal of Medicine, to quantify the problem. 

A healthcare-software startup in Israel is reporting that it has created a constantly improving algorithm that is better at reading mammography exams “than radiologists using the best computer-aided detection methods.”

Mammograms are the first step when women are on the lookout for breast cancer. But for some women, especially those with dense breasts and who have a special risk according to family history, additional screening might make sense. 

The color pink has become almost inextricably associated with breast cancer research, especially during October. For many people, wearing pink clothes or using pink products can feel like a way to morally support friends and family who have had the disease while also monetarily contribute to research that could find ways to save lives. 

It’s not unusual for radiologists reviewing prior breast imaging exams to discover cancers that went missed the first time around. Such circumstances can and should provide a valuable learning opportunity, according to the authors of an article running in the November-December edition of Current Problems in Diagnostic Radiology.

When to start? And how often after that? The mammography deliberations get a long, thoughtful airing in the pages of the Press Democrat newspaper based in Santa Rosa, California.