The prognosis of certain serious diseases, such as many types of cancer, improves significantly if detected early. For this reason, in certain cases it is highly advisable to undergo preventive tests on a more or less routine basis, especially if there is any factor that increases the risk of suffering from said disease.
However, and as is logical, undergoing regular tests increases the risk of taking some scare in the form of a false positive. This is something normal and not serious (subsequent checks usually rule it out), but it must be taken into account.
A higher risk for young women
The risk of false positives can be considerable. For example, an investigation carried out by scientists from the University of California whose results have been published in the specialized media JAMA Network Open has found that even 50% of all women who get 3D mammograms annually get a false positive within a decade.
For these purposes, we define the false positive in a digital breast tomosynthesis (technical name of the test) as that case in which the image is considered abnormal, but subsequent tests rule out breast cancer.
Also, the paper concludes that the risk of false positives with 3D mammography is only modestly less than that with 2D mammography. On the other hand, not equally distributed among all women: Low density in the breast tissue and advanced age are also factors that decrease it.
It must be taken into account that breast cancer is, in many developed countries, one of the leading causes of death in women. For this reason, early detection practices, such as performing mammograms of one type or another on a routine basis, are an important tool that can help save many lives.
However, false positive results also have some impact. For the patient, can be a major source of anxiety and they can suppose the subjection to later diagnostic tests more or less invasive unnecessary; for the health system, avoidable economic and opportunity costs.
For this reason, the authors of the work underline the importance of taking into account, when establishing the preventive program for each patient, certain particularities of their specific case, such as risk factors they operate or even their own preferences.
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