Mammography and computerized decision systems: a review.

Computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) systems in mammography have been developed and investigated for several years and recently they have left the research stage to enter the clinical stage. The purpose of this article is to review the present situation of mammography for breast cancer detection and the role played by CAD systems. Results from the recent literature show that CAD systems have the potential to improve the sensitivities of radiologists in the detection of malignant clustered microcalcifications and masses, while keeping specificities at acceptable levels. This leads to the conclusion that CAD systems can be incorporated into clinical practice as a double reading option to radiologists. However, some issues have yet to be tackled for CAD systems to gain better acceptance and more widespread use worldwide.