Is Background Parenchymal Enhancement in Breast Magnetic Resonance Imaging Associated with Breast Cancer?

Abstract

Background: Background parenchymal enhancement (BPE) in breast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) potentially correlates with breast cancer (BC). Thus, BPE may be used for BC risk stratification and for monitoring chemo-prevention. Objectives: We aimed to investigate the BPE patterns in benign and malignant breast lesions and in pre-menopausal and post-menopausal women. Methods: In 2017, 128 consecutive pre-menopausal or post-menopausal patients underwent breast MRI with different indications were examined. Subjects with the history of breast surgery, radiotherapy, or chemotherapy were excluded. A 1.5 Tesla device was used with the same protocol, and a blinded radiologist visually assessed and categorized breast BPE as minimal, mild, moderate, and marked. We used frequency distribution, mean, and standard deviation to report the findings. Comparing age or BPE in categorical variables, we appropriately used ANOVA, or Chi-square and Fisher’s exact tests. Results: The mean (± standard deviation) age was 42.43 (± 10.82) years, and 89 (69.5%) patients were hormonally active. Eighteen (14.1%), 55 (43.0%), 41 (32.0%), and 14 (10.9%) patients were classified as having minimal, mild, moderate, and marked BPE, respectively. Age did not change among BPE levels (P = 0.197). Prevalence of moderate and marked BPE was higher in pre-menopausal women. BPE was not associated with breast lesion histopathology (P value = 0.857) in pre-menopausal or post-menopausal women (P = 0.790, and 0.840, respectively). Conclusions: BPE is a measure of breast tissue hormonal activity, and it is not correlated with histopathological diagnosis of breast lesion in both pre-menopausal and post-menopausal women. The data of this study do not support the use of BPE for BC risk estimation.