Assessing the stand-alone sensitivity of computer-aided detection with cancer cases from the Digital Mammographic Imaging Screening Trial.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess the sensitivities and false-detection rates of two computer-aided detection (CADe) systems when applied to digital or film-screen mammograms in detecting the known breast cancer cases from the Digital Mammographic Imaging Screening Trial (DMIST) breast cancer screening population.

Materials And Methods: Available film-screen and digital mammograms of 161 breast cancer cases from DMIST were analyzed by two CADe systems, iCAD Second-Look and R2 ImageChecker. Three experienced breast-imaging radiologists reviewed the CADe marks generated for each available cancer case, recording the number and locations of CADe marks and whether each CADe mark location corresponded with the known location of the cancer.

Results: For the 161 cancer cases included in this study, the sensitivities of the DMIST reader without CAD were 0.43 (69/161, 95% CI 0.35-0.51) for digital and 0.41 (66/161, 0.33-0.49) for film-screen mammography. The sensitivities of iCAD were 0.74 (119/161, 0.66-0.81) for digital and 0.69 (111/161, 0.61-0.76) for film-screen mammography, both significantly higher than the DMIST study sensitivities (p < 0.0001 for both). The average number of false CADe marks per case of iCAD was 2.57 (SD, 1.92) for digital and 3.06(1.72) for film-screen mammography. The sensitivity of R2 was 0.74 (119/161, 0.66-0.81) for digital, and 0.60 (97/161, 0.52-0.68) for film-screen mammography, both significantly higher than the DMIST study sensitivities (p < 0.0001 for both). The average number of false CADe marks per case of R2 was 2.07 (1.57) for digital and 1.52 (1.45) for film-screen mammography.

Conclusion: Our results suggest the use of CADe in interpretation of digital and film-screen mammograms could lead to improvements in cancer detection.