While a breast cancer cure remains elusive, several advancements in the realm of diagnosis and treatment are on the horizon. With an estimated 178,700 new cases expected to crop up in women and 1,600 new cases among men this year, any advances are welcome news. Answers Come from Unexpected Places As in the testing of aircraft tires, applying a carefully measured amount of air pressure to the breast can reveal abnormalities within the tissue. The air pressure creates a specific pattern of lines that shows up in a laser photographic process known as holography interferometry. Loughry is conducting a study to gauge the accuracy of this process for detecting breast abnormalities.
Cancerous tissue is different from the surrounding breast tissue.
It's harder and has a lot of fibrosis and an increase in vascularity. We think it will be a great method of early detection. When detection of the disease happens earlier, treatment is much more successful. Once a lesion is detected, however, a biopsy is necessary to determine whether it is cancerous. In the past, this has always meant surgery, but not anymore.