Breast Cancer Adjuvant Radiotherapy in Up-Front to Chemotherapy: Is There a Worthwhile Benefit? A Preliminary Report.

Purpose: We administered a new breast cancer (BC) adjuvant therapy sequence that delivered postoperative radiotherapy (PORT) before chemotherapy (CT). Our aim was to assess the gain in time to start PORT and the G2-G3 acute-subacute toxicity rate of whole breast adjuvant hypofractionated radiotherapy (AH-RT) administered up-front to the third-generation adjuvant CT (A-CT) in high-risk nodal positive BC in a preliminary report at 2 years.

Methods: This retrospective study analysed the duration of treatment and safety of AH-RT administered up-front to A-CT in high-risk nodal positive BC patients (pts).

Normalized glandular dose coefficients for digital breast tomosynthesis systems with a homogeneous breast model.

This work aims at calculating and releasing tabulated values of dose conversion coefficients, DgN, for mean glandular dose (MGD) estimates in digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT). The DgN coefficients are proposed as unique conversion coefficients for MGD estimates, in place of dose conversion coefficients in mammography (DgN or c, g, s triad as proposed in worldwide quality assurance protocols) used together with the T correction factor. DgN is the MGD per unit incident air kerma measured at the breast surface for a 0° projection and the entire tube load used for the scan.

Technical evaluation of image quality in synthetic mammograms obtained from 15° and 40° digital breast tomosynthesis in a commercial system: a quantitative comparison.

Digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) has recently gained interest both for breast cancer screening and diagnosis. Its employment has increased also in conjunction with digital mammography (DM), to improve cancer detection and reduce false positive recall rate. Synthetic mammograms (SMs) reconstructed from DBT data have been introduced to replace DM in the DBT + DM approach, for preserving the benefits of the dual-acquisition modality whilst reducing radiation dose and compression time.

Average absorbed breast dose (2ABD): an easy radiation dose index for digital breast tomosynthesis.

Background: To propose a practical and simple method to individually evaluate the average absorbed dose for digital breast tomosynthesis.

Methods: The method is based on the estimate of incident air kerma (k) on the breast surface. An analytical model was developed to calculate the k from the tube voltage, tube load, breast thickness, x-ray tube yield, and anode-filter combination.

Comprehensive assessment of image quality in synthetic and digital mammography: a quantitative comparison.

Recent advances in digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) technology were focused on the reconstruction of 2D "Synthesized Mammograms" (SMs) from DBT dataset. The introduction of SMs could avoid an additional digital mammography (DM) which is often required in complement to DBT examinations. Therefore, breast absorbed dose and compression time can be significantly reduced in DBT+SM procedures with respect to DBT+DM modality.

Monte Carlo evaluation of glandular dose in cone-beam X-ray computed tomography dedicated to the breast: Homogeneous and heterogeneous breast models.

Purpose: In cone-beam computed tomography dedicated to the breast (BCT), the mean glandular dose (MGD) is the dose metric of reference, evaluated from the measured air kerma by means of normalized glandular dose coefficients (DgN). This work aimed at computing, for a simple breast model, a set of DgN values for monoenergetic and polyenergetic X-ray beams, and at validating the results vs. those for patient specific digital phantoms from BCT scans.