The Annals of Internal Medicine has released another of its "Beyond the Guidelines" features, this time with a focus on evaluating breast density and screening from the perspective of a patient.
The October 2 article -- titled "Should This Woman With Dense Breasts Receive Supplemental Breast Cancer Screening?" -- is based on a grand rounds discussion conducted at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) in Boston. It explores how to apply current guidelines and research on breast density and screening for a patient for whom the "optimal clinical management is unclear."
Participants in the discussion included Dr. Gerald Smetana of BIDMC; Dr. Joann Elmore of the University of California, Los Angeles; Dr. Christoph Lee of the University of Washington in Seattle; and Dr. Risa Burns, also of BIDMC.
Videos of the conference and a slide presentation are available on the Annals of Internal Medicine website.













![A normal mammogram confirmed by three-year radiologic follow-up illustrates reader-marked regions of interest (ROIs) during (A) unaided (round 1) and (B) artificial intelligence (AI)–assisted (round 2) reading. Each colored dot represents an ROI for recall by a human reader. Readers could mark more than one ROI per case, represented by multiple dots of the same color. During AI-assisted reading, the AI system displayed three visible prompts: two with suspicion of malignancy scores of 35% (left mediolateral oblique [L MLO] and craniocaudal [L CC]) and one with a suspicion of malignancy score of 10% (right craniocaudal [R CC]), shown as polygonal overlays. Without AI, six of 10 readers (60%) marked a false-positive ROI. With AI assistance, this fell to two of 10 (20%). R MLO = right mediolateral oblique.](https://img.auntminnie.com/mindful/smg/workspaces/default/uploads/2026/07/2026-07-14-radiology-mammogram-ai-auto-bias.H0bYO8QlWs.jpg?auto=format%2Ccompress&fit=crop&h=112&q=70&w=112)





