Preoperative roentgenographically guided percutaneous localization of occult breast lesions: three-year experience with 180 patients and description of a method.

The identification of a suspicious occult breast lesion with mammography should, in most instances, result in roentgenographically guided localization followed by surgical excision. Over a three-year period, we performed 180 roentgenographically guided preoperative localizations for occult breast lesions, 32% (57/180) of which were malignant. Of the total, there were 85 masses and 95 clustered microcalcifications. We prefer to use a modified hookwire for lesion localization.