Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential benefits of using breast density measurement software to identify women with dense breast tissue for the purpose of prioritising those women for breast cancer screening.

In 2019, the United Kingdom National Screening Committee (UK NSC) commissioned a systematic review to look at the issue of breast density. The review found that breast density is related to risk of breast cancer. However, breast density measurements are not yet robust or repeatable enough, there is no ‘gold standard’ test to validate breast density measurements. For these reasons that the UK NSC recommended that additional screening with ultrasound after a negative mammography screening in women with dense breasts should not be introduced. More robust evidence is needed before risk stratification can be considered within the breast screening programme.