A quantitative study of the volumetric breast density and related breast characteristics in Chinese women
Objective To quantitatively analyse the volumetric breast density(VBD)and related breast characteristics of women in several regions of China and their distribution patterns in different regions and at different ages by using three-dimensional imaging data from breast cone-beam CT(CBCT).Methods A total of 1 440 breast CBCT images from three tertiary hospitals in north,southwest and south China were retrospectively investigated.Measurements of VBD and breast characteristics were aided by a threshold-based segmentation tool and dedicated measurement tools in the Koning Imaging Viewer system.Differences in breast characteristics between regions and age groups were assessed using the Kruskal-Wallis H-test;Spearman correlation coefficients were used to analyze the correlation between each breast characteristic and age and between breast size and breast density characteristics.Results The median values for effective diameter of the breast at chest-wall(De(f),chest-wall to nipple length(CNL),breast volume(BV),glandular volume(GV)and VBD for the surveyed groups were 12.5,6.8 cm;374.5,48.6 cm3and 14.6％,respectively.The distributions of Deff,CNL,BV and GV varies in different regions,and the distribution of VBD has no significant difference beetween regions.Deff and CNL had a significant positive correlation with age.In comparison,GV and VBD had a significant negative correlation with age.Deff,CNL and BV were all significantly negatively correlated with VBD.Conclusions This study investigated the parameters of breast size and density characteristics in women from several regions of China,which can provide the data basis for further studies on the establishment of non-compression breast phantom,dose assessment for breast CBCT patients,and breast cancer risk assessment.
BreastCharacteristicsVolumetric breast densityBreast cone-beam CTMammography
NETL
NSTL
万方数据
