Researchers validate self-reported screening mammography histories.

2003 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- Researchers validate self-reported screening mammography histories.

According to published research from the United States, "As part of a case-control study of the efficacy of screening mammography, the authors validated the mammography histories of 2,495 women aged 40-64 years with incident breast cancer diagnosed in 1994-1998 and a 25% random sample of 615 controls never diagnosed with breast cancer, all reporting a mammogram in the past 5 years.

"Subjects from five metropolitan areas of the United States were cross-classified by facility records ('gold standard') and self-report according to history of a recent screening mammogram (within 1 year or within 2 years)," wrote S.A. Norman and colleagues, University of Pennsylvania, Clinical Epidemiology & Biostatistics Center.

"Sensitivity and specificity of self-reported screening at 1 year were 0.93 and 0.82, respectively, for cases and 0.92 and 0.80 for controls. At 2 years, sensitivity and specificity were 0.97 and 0.78 for both cases and controls. Confidence intervals for the differences in sensitivity and specificity were narrow and included zero," the researchers wrote.

"Scant evidence was found of telescoping (recollection of events as more recent than actual)," they added. ...