AI Mammograms Reveal Hidden Heart Disease Risk in Women
- 4 days ago
- 2 min read
Routine breast cancer screenings may soon do double duty, serving as a powerful, life-saving tool for heart health. According to newly published research in the European Heart Journal, artificial intelligence can now analyze standard mammograms to identify a woman’s risk for major cardiovascular events, such as heart attacks and strokes.
The breakthrough centers on the detection of breast arterial calcifications (BAC)—dangerous calcium buildups within the blood vessels of the breast. By deploying a transformer-based neural network, a team of researchers from Emory University and the Mayo Clinic Enterprise successfully analyzed the screening scans of over 123,000 women who had no prior history of cardiovascular disease.
The findings are stark: women whose AI mammograms showed severe arterial calcification carried two to three times the risk of experiencing a major adverse cardiovascular event compared to women with zero calcification. Alarmingly, this elevated risk held true even for women under the age of 50, a demographic traditionally considered to be at low risk for heart disease.
Unlike coronary artery blockages that restrict blood flow, calcifications in breast tissue affect a separate layer of the blood vessel, leading to increased artery stiffness typically associated with long-term hypertension. The AI model's automated quantification of these calcifications proved to be an independent predictor of heart disease, effectively adding valuable prognostic data to traditional risk assessments like the PREVENT score.
For patients, the most significant benefit is that this "opportunistic" cardiovascular screening requires no extra cost, appointments, or radiation exposure. Dr. Hari Trivedi of Emory University noted that this technology could prompt vital early conversations between women and their doctors regarding preventive steps, such as cholesterol testing.
As Dr. Lori Daniels, a cardiologist at UC San Diego, pointed out in an accompanying editorial, fewer than 40% of women know their cholesterol levels, yet nearly 70% of U.S. women over 45 are up-to-date with their mammography. By leveraging a trusted cancer-screening platform, AI mammograms have the potential to vastly improve the early detection of cardiovascular disease—the leading cause of death among women.
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Keywords: AI Mammograms
AI Mammograms
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