A diagnostic strategy for breast calcifications based on a long-term follow-up of 615 lesions

To clarify the long-term outcomes of breast calcifications after stereotactic vacuum-assisted breast biopsy (SVAB) and to develop strategy after SVAB.

Subject comprised 594 patients with 615 calcifications who underwent SVAB. 371 (60.3%) lesions were diagnosed as benign, 38 (6.2%) as indeterminate, and 206 (33.5%) as malignant. We retrospectively reviewed post-biopsy courses of non-malignant lesions which were followed. A histopathological review was performed for false negatives to clarify the reasons.

Of the 308 patients with benign lesions, with a median follow-up time of 55.8 months, re-biopsy was performed for 11 (3.6%) due to changes of imaging, and 4 (1.3%) were diagnosed as breast cancer. Of the 36 patients with indeterminate lesion, re-biopsy was performed for 16 (44.4%), and 8 (22.2%) were diagnosed as breast cancer, while 20 (55.6%) showed no changes in imaging with a median follow-up time of 91.7 months without re-biopsy. Weak atypism of intraductal carcinoma may cause a false-negative diagnosis in SVAB for breast calcifications.

When SVAB results in non-malignant, patients may be followed by annual screening, while re-biopsy needs to be performed for the patients with a discordant result of SVAB and with changes in an imaging finding during a follow-up.