title: Comparative pathology of prevalent and incident cancers detected by breast screening. Edinburgh Breast Screening Project.
abstract: In the Edinburgh Breast Screening Project 210 cancers were detected from commencement in 1979 up to December, 1984. By this time the full initial cohort had completed at least 3 visits and a proportion had attended for up to 5 visits, so pathological characteristics for prevalent and incident cancers could be compared. The main differences are in distribution of histological type of cancer, detection of occult invasive disease, and lymph-node positivity among incident tumours. Only the first of these was statistically significant. This evaluation shows that cancer detection by screening in Edinburgh conforms with screening theory, in which detection of good prognosis tumours is favoured at the prevalence screens, and faster growing, aggressive tumours are found at the incidence screens. Qualitative histopathology may provide a better measure than standard quantitative judgments of size and lymph node status to compare the varieties of cancer detected by screening programmes and to understand the biology of the disease.
authors.forename: T J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Anderson
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lamb
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Alexander
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Lutz
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Chetty
authors.forename: A P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Forrest
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kirkpatrick
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Muir
authors.forename: M M
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Roberts
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Huggins
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008207:Lymphatic Metastasis; D008327:Mammography; D008403:Mass Screening; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D012606:Scotland; D013997:Time Factors