Association between Parenchymal Enhancement of the Contralateral Breast in Dynamic Contrast-enhanced MR Imaging and Outcome of Patients with Unilateral Invasive Breast Cancer

Abstract

Results suggest that parenchymal enhancement in the contralateral breast of patients with invasive unilateral breast cancer is significantly associated with long-term outcome, particularly in patients with estrogen receptor-positive, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative breast cancer. Lower value of the mean top 10% enhancement of the parenchyma shows potential as a predictive biomarker for relatively poor outcome in patients who undergo endocrine therapy. These results should, however, be validated in a larger study.

Evaluation of background parenchymal enhancement on breast MRI: a systematic review

“…8,10,[12][13][14][15]21,23,26,28,[32][33][34][35][36]38,[40][41][42][43][48][49][50][51][52][53][54]57,59,61 In five studies, 11,17,19,29,44 the authors acknowledged that owing to the retrospective nature of the study, it was not possible to analyze the point of menstrual cycle, although, following institutional protocol, screening breast MRI of patients who were pre-menopausal was performed during the second week of the menstrual cycle. In a total of 14 studies, the authors stated the menstrual period.…”

“…7 The "degree" of BPE is linked to the risk of developing breast cancer, may affect the reading of breast MRI, the staging and the risk of cancer and even the long-term outcome, particularly in patients with certain subtypes at immunohistochemistry. [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] BPE can be visually assessed qualitatively using the Breast Imaging-Reporting and Data System (BI-RADS) scores or quantitatively using software. 7,16 However, radiologist agreement for BPE qualitative evaluation is fair 17 and, to the best of our knowledge, there is a lack of uniformity on quantitative measurements of BPE on breast MRI.…”

Identifying relations between imaging phenotypes and molecular subtypes of breast cancer: Model discovery and external validation

“…Additionally, most only focus on the tumor, ignoring the surrounding breast tissue. A few recent studies have shown that the appearance of background parenchymal enhancement (BPE) on DCE MR imaging is associated with breast cancer risk (22,23), triple-negative breast cancer (15), response to chemotherapy (24,25), local recurrence (26), disease-free survival and overall survival (27), suggesting an important role of BPE in breast cancer.…”

Quantitative evaluation of background parenchymal enhancement (BPE) on breast MRI. A feasibility study with a semi-automatic and automatic software compared to observer-based scores

“…5 A link between higher BPE values and breast cancer diagnoses was already noted in the past, 4 but only recently has BPE been associated with long-term outcome, particularly in patients with oestrogen receptor-positive, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative breast cancer. 9 These results suggested that BPE could be an important biomarker of a female's individual breast cancer risk. 5 However, the medical literature lacks simple and reliable method to assess BPE quantitatively.…”

“…6,7 Also, the degree of BPE affected the detection and staging of breast cancer using MRI. 8 A recent retrospective study 9 stated that parenchymal enhancement in the contralateral breast of patients with invasive unilateral breast cancer is significantly associated with long-term outcome, particularly in patients with certain subtypes at immunohistochemistry. Normally, BPE can be classified visually on the basis of the percentage of glandular tissue demonstrating enhancement on fat-suppressed or subtracted breast MRI.…”