Senology-the urgent need for a specialty.

Expert physicians from many European and Latin American countries are engaged in a systematic effort to persuade influential colleagues and government officials to recognize senology as a well-defined scientific discipline and establish it as an independent specialty. The task is complex, as the establishment of a new specialty always is. Senology is not a superfluous specialty; it is similar in characteristics and indications to many other single organ-targeted specialties such as cardiology, hematology, nephrology, neurology, and others.

Breast tumors: composition of microcalcifications.

The authors investigated the crystallographic patterns of calcifications in breast tissue from 31 patients, including eight calcified benign lesions, 17 calcified carcinomas, and six noncalcified control samples. Scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive x-ray analysis, and x-ray diffraction with the Guinier camera were employed and yielded information on the shape and composition of breast calcifications. Polyhedral crystals (with energy-dispersive x-ray analysis response to calcium) contained calcite, aragonite, or calcium oxalate, depending on the case.