Swiss breast cancer screening quality varies across cantons

Quality of breast cancer screening not equally good in all cantons Keystone-SDA

The quality of breast cancer screening programmes in Switzerland varies from canton to canton. However, according to a study published on Tuesday, the results align with the European standard.

Fourteen cantons invite all women between the ages of 50 and 69 (50 to 74 in nine cantons) to a mammography screening programme every two years. Screening can also occur outside a public health programme, through so-called opportunistic screening, which is the only option in the twelve cantons without a public programme.

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The results of these programmes have been regularly monitored since 2010 to ensure quality. The study published on Tuesday by the University Centre for General Medicine and Public Health (Unisanté) in Lausanne was conducted on behalf of the Swiss Cancer Screening Association.

The study is based on three million anonymised data sets of screening tests carried out in ten programmes in fourteen cantons (Vaud, Valais, Geneva, Fribourg, Bern-Jura-Neuchâtel, Thurgau, St Gallen, Graubünden, Bern-Solothurn, Basel City, Ticino).

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The report focussed mainly on women between the ages of 50 and 69. Additionally, the period between 2019 and 2021 was compared with previous periods for this sixth monitoring, as Unisanté stated in a press release on Tuesday.

Differences in quality

The analysis revealed persistent differences in the quality of screening between the programmes. The risk of a woman receiving a false positive result in her first screening can triple (from six to 17.4 per 1,000 women screened), depending on the canton in which she has her mammogram.

In the screenings that followed every two years, the interpretations of the images became more homogeneous and stable overall. The comparison with the previous X-ray examination facilitated the diagnosis. According to the study, the reasons for the observed differences between the various programmes are unclear.

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Good effectiveness

On average, cancer was detected in seven out of 1,000 women who took part in a screening programme for the first time. According to Unisanté, the benefits of early detection are generally greater if a woman regularly takes part in the screening programme.

Another encouraging result is that more than 70% of breast cancers are detected at an early stage. Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women. In Switzerland, of the around 6,500 women who are affected every year, 80% are aged 50 or older at the time of diagnosis.

Adapted from German by DeepL/amva

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