A risk model for digital breast tomosynthesis to predict breast cancer and guide clinical care

Screening with digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) improves breast cancer detection and reduces false positives. However, currently, no breast cancer risk model takes advantage of the additional information generated by DBT imaging for breast cancer risk prediction. We developed and internally validated a DBT-based short-term risk model for predicting future late-stage and interval breast cancers after negative screening exams. We included the available 805 incident breast cancers and a random sample of 5173 healthy women matched on year of study entry in a nested case-control study from 154,200 multiethnic women, aged 35 to 74, attending DBT screening in the United States between 2014 and 2019. A relative risk model was trained using elastic net logistic regression and nested cross-validation to estimate risks for using imaging features and age. An absolute risk model was developed using derived risks and U.S. incidence and competing mortality rates. Absolute risks, discrimination performance, and risk stratification were estimated in the left-out validation set. The discrimination performance of 1-year risk was 0.82 (95% CI, 0.79 to 0.85) with good calibration (P = 0.7). Using the U.S. Preventive Service Task Force guidelines, 14% of the women were at high risk, 19.6 times higher compared to general risk. In this high-risk group, 76% of stage II and III cancers and 59%of stage 0 cancers were observed (P < 0.01). Using mammographic features generated from DBT screens, our image-based risk prediction model could guide radiologists in selecting women for clinical care, potentially leading to earlier detection and improved prognoses.

Automated summary

Screening with digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) improves breast cancer detection and reduces false positives. A DBT-based risk model was developed and validated, which can predict the occurrence of breast cancer. By using imaging features and age for risk assessment, our model can assist radiologists in selecting women for clinical care, leading to earlier detection and improved prognoses.