Studies prove mammography saves lives. The screening tool can detect breast cancer early when it's still curable.

But for the thousands of women with dense breast tissue, mammography is not enough.

These women may need additional screening tests such as MRI’s. Now, Mayo Clinic researchers have developed new technology that can spot breast tumors in dense tissue at a fraction of the cost of MRI’s.

It’s called molecular breast imaging. And initial studies at Mayo Clinic show this new screening tool for breast cancer is better than mammography at detecting tumors in women with dense breast tissue.

"We found that molecular breast imaging found three times more cancers than mammography in women who have dense breast tissue and are at increased risk of cancer."

Dr. Deborah Rhodes says dense breast tissue appears white on mammograms and so do cancerous tumors which make them hard to spot. One potential alternative is MRI which is very good at detecting tumors, but they're very expensive and they have a high false positive rate, meaning they pick up spots that turn out not to be cancer. The new test is less expensive to use than MRI and has fewer false positive results. Women who undergo the test have an injection of a radio tracer that travels to breast tumors and lights them up. You can see in these images how molecular breast imaging detects a cancer which mammography does not.

"The results we got are very good. So if these are borne out in a large scale study it's possible that this may be an alternative to mammography in general." a new tool in the fight against breast cancer.

Molecular breast imaging requires significantly less breast compression than mammography, so it's pain free. The Doctors say molecular breast imaging is still in the research phase and may not be ready for general use for years.