The cost-effectiveness of mammography-based female breast cancer screening in Canadian populations: a systematic review

Introduction Mammography-based breast cancer screening is an important aspect of female breast cancer prevention within the Canadian healthcare system. The current literature on female breast cancer screening is largely focused on the health outcomes that result from screening. There is comparatively little data on the cost-effectiveness of the screening. Therefore, this paper sought to conduct a systematic review of the literature on the cost effectiveness of mammography-based breast cancer screening within female Canadian populations. Materials and methods A systematic review was performed in the PubMed database to identify all studies published within the last 10 years that addressed breast cancer screening and evaluate cost-effectiveness in a Canadian population. Results The search yielded five studies for inclusion, only three of which were applicable to average-risk Canadian women. The benefits of mortality reduction rose approximately linearly with costs, while costs were linearly dependent on the number of lifetime screens per woman. Moreover, triennial screening for average-risk women aged 50-69 years was found to be the most cost-effective in terms of cost per quality adjusted life year. The use of MRI in conjunction with mammography for women with the BRCA 1/2 mutation was found to be cost-effective while annual mammography-based screening for women with dense breasts was found to be cost-ineffective. Conclusion In spite of the growing interest to enhance breast cancer screening programs, analyses of the cost-effectiveness of mammography-based screening within Canadian populations are scarcely reported and have heterogeneous methodologies. The existing data suggests that Canada’s current breast cancer screening policy to screen average-risk women aged 50-74, biennially or triennially is cost-effective. These findings could be of interest to health policy makers when making decisions regarding resource allocation; however, further studies in this field are required in order to make stronger recommendations regarding cost-effectiveness.