IC213: Artifacts on Digital Mammography: What Are They and How Do I Fix Them (Priscilla Slanetz, MD, MPH); Masses, Distortions and Asymmetries (Mary Mahoney, MD)

The 2008 ARRS Annual Meeting in Washington, DC, on April 13-18, will feature an instructional course on digital mammography artifacts (IC213). The first part of the course is entitled, “Artifacts on Digital Mammography: What Are They and How Do I Fix Them.” This presentation features Priscilla Slanetz, MD, MPH, who is a radiologist at Boston Medical Center and an associate professor of radiology at Boston University School of Medicine, as well as being a member of the WomensImagingOnline.org panel.

According to Dr. Slanetz, she will be showing commonly encountered artifacts seen on digital mammography. The educational goals of the session are to be able to recognize these artifacts, understand their causes, and if needed, to be able to correct the problem. In general, artifacts can be related to the patient, the detector, or the software processing algorithm through which the digital data is processed prior to display on the computer screen.

“Recognition of artifacts is critical as they can potentially interfere with the interpretation of the mammogram. As there is currently no standardized quality control program for digital mammography, as compared to film-screen mammography, it is important for radiologists and technologists to be aware of these artifacts and how to correct them if they do encounter them. This will help to ensure optimal image quality and allow us to provide high quality patient care,” said Dr. Slanetz.

Currently, there is no published literature on this topic, so attendees should find the information presented in this instructional course both useful and valuable. In addition, as more practices start to convert from film-screen to digital mammography, this course will likely have clinical relevance for many radiologists, technologists, and physicists. “As a result of the course, I hope that the participants will be able to recognize these artifacts and have a general idea about how to correct the problem. An understanding of the artifacts on digital mammograms is critical to ensure optimal image quality,” said Dr. Slanetz.

In addition to Dr. Slanetz’s presentation, Mary Mahoney, MD, director of breast imaging at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, will lecture on the topic, “Masses, Distortions, and Asymmetries,” which will cover the mammographic evaluation of these breast findings.

“This is a very important part of what we do every day in terms of looking at breast imaging. The most concerning lesions that we see with mammography are small spiculated masses that can be very subtle and that can be just small areas of asymmetry or distortion. These small, subtle densities are the hardest to see, but they are also the most important in terms of detecting cancers in women,” said Dr. Mahoney.

Dr. Mahoney will present a large variety of examples and images in her presentation to help attendees further solidify their grasp of this fundamental part of mammography reading.

IC213 takes place on Tuesday, April 15, at 4:15 pm. For more information about the 2008 ARRS Annual Meeting, visit www.arrs.org/meetings/ano8/.

For more information on the women's imaging instructional courses, visit WIO's ARRS 2008 Annual Meeting Instructional Course Section.