To evaluate the significance and clinical application of MicroPure imaging in the detection of breast microcalcification by comparing with full-field digital mammography (FFDM).

We selected 126 breast lesions confirmed by surgical pathology at the First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University from November 2016 to November 2017. The lesions were divided into a tumor with calcification group, a simple calcification group, and a no calcification group (simple lumps and non-lumps without calcification). All patients underwent FFDM and MicroPure imaging before surgery, and the accuracy of detection of breast microcalcification by FFDM and MicroPure was compared. Using pathological results as the gold standard, ROC curve was plotted to evaluate the efficiency of the two imaging methods in detecting breast microcalcification. The Z test was used to compare whether the areas under the curves of the two imaging methods had a difference.

The specificity of MicroPure in detecting microcalcification in the mass was lower than that of FFDM (83% vs 91%), while the sensitivity was higher than that of FFDM (96% vs 91%). The areas under the ROC curves were 0.894 and 0.909, respectively, and they had equivalent diagnostic value for microcalcification in the mass (Z=0.25, P>0.05). The specificity and sensitivity of MicroPure imaging in detecting simple microcalcification were lower than those of FFDM (25% vs 87%; 79% vs 91%), and the areas under the ROC curves were 0.522 and 0.893, respectively, which suggested that FFDM had better diagnostic value compared with Micropure imaging for simple microcalcification (Z=3.71, P<0.05).

MicroPure imaging has a low specificity than FFDM in detecting breast microcalcification, but it has a high sensitivity in detecting microcalcification in breast masses, which is helpful for ultrasound doctors to distinguish benign and malignant breast lesions.