Obligatory medical device diagnostics.
- Mammography (X-ray examination of the breast) – part of breast cancer screening guidelines for women between the ages of 50 and 70; currently the only method that detects precancerous lesions/early stages; examination of both mammaries mandatory
- Mammasonography (ultrasound examination of the breast; breast ultrasound) – as a basic diagnostic tool in suspected breast cancer; in women < 40 years of age as the diagnostic tool of first choice; but is considered an additional diagnostic tool in unclear findings / recurrences (recurrence of breast cancer); examination of both mammary obligatory.
Optional medical device diagnostics – depending on the results of the history, physical examination and obligatory medical device diagnostics – for differential diagnostic clarification.
- Mamma MRI (magnetic resonance mammography (MRM; magnetic resonance imaging – mammary; mammary magnetic resonance imaging; mammary MRI; MR mammography; MRI mammography) – indicated as local staging in lobular breast carcinoma; if necessary, also in the case of unclear findings of mammography or sonography.
- Punch, vacuum or open biopsy (tissue sampling).
- Galactography (contrast imaging of the milk ducts).
Staging examinations include (pretherapeutic in locally advanced findings or suspected metastases; usually not indicated in pT1pN0).
- X-ray of the chest (chest x-ray/chest x-ray), in two planes – to exclude pulmonary metastases (daughter tumors).
- Liver sonography – to exclude liver metastases.
- Skeletal scintigraphy (nuclear medicine procedure that can represent functional changes in the skeletal system, in which regionally (locally) pathologically (pathologically) increased or decreased bone remodeling processes are present) – to exclude bone metastases.
