A. Current indications for breast MRI include, but are not limited to:
1. Screening
a. For high-risk patients – Clinical trials from the United States and Europe have demonstrated that breast MRI can significantly improve the detection of cancer that is otherwise clinically, mammographically, and sonographically occult [1-13]. Patients should be referred for screening breast MRI, preferably after risk assessment and counseling of high risk patients by personnel trained in the assessment of hereditary breast cancer or by their referring physician who has used a risk assessment model. Breast MRI may be indicated in the surveillance of women with more than a 20% lifetime risk of breast cancer (for example, individuals with genetic predisposition to breast cancer by either gene testing or family pedigree, or individuals with a history of mantle radiation for Hodgkin’s disease). Although there is no direct evidence that screening with MRI will reduce mortality, it is thought that early detection by using annual MRI as surveillance, in addition to mammography, may be useful.
b. For patients with a new breast malignancy - Screening of the contralateral breast with MRI in patients with a new breast malignancy can detect occult malignancy in the contralateral breast in at least 3% to 5% of breast cancer patients [5,14-16]. For this reason, it may be used as a diagnostic tool to identify more completely the extent of disease in patients with a recent breast cancer diagnosis.
c. For patients with breast augmentation - Breast MRI using contrast may be indicated in the evaluation of patients with silicone or saline implants and/or free injections with silicone, paraffin, or polyacrylamide gel in whom mammography is difficult. The integrity of silicone implants can be determined by noncontrast MRI.