Major breast tomo trial opens for enrollment

The Tomosynthesis Mammographic Imaging Screening Trial (TMIST) is open for enrollment, according to a statement released by the ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group and the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

Researchers plan to enroll 165,000 women between the ages of 45 and 74 who are already planning to undergo routine screening mammography. The trial will compare two types of digital mammography: 3D, or tomosynthesis, and 2D, or conventional. The study will follow all participants for breast cancer status, treatment, and outcomes from the time of enrollment until the end of the study in 2025.

"We need to determine if 3D mammography is better than 2D at finding the sort of breast cancers that are most likely to spread and kill women," said study chair Dr. Etta Pisano of Harvard Medical School in the statement.

One hundred U.S. mammography clinics plan to participate in the trial. Women will be informed about the opportunity to enroll when they schedule their mammogram; once they are enrolled, they will be assigned to either 2D or 3D mammography screening. Most women will be screened annually, although postmenopausal women with no high-risk factors will be screened every two years.

The trial will also be used to build a data repository for future research on genetic markers for breast cancer by inviting participants to submit blood samples and swabs of cells from the mouth, according to ECOG-ACRIN and the NCI.