Use of preoperative breast MRI to determine disease extent

Breast MRI can be performed in the preoperative workup of patients with biopsy-proven breast cancer to size lesions, if there is discrepancy regarding the extent of disease from clinical, mammography or ultrasound assessment, and to identify multicentric or multifocal disease. The purpose of breast MRI is to plan the optimum surgical procedure, thus reducing the local tumour recurrence rate and the need for the patient to undergo additional surgery.