THURSDAY, June 26 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers have devised a new breast-imaging technology that appears to be as accurate as MRI scans but several times cheaper.

The technique, called molecular breast imaging (MBI), is still in the early stages of development, the scientists added.

"We envision MBI being useful for women who are not served well by mammography, those who have mammographically dense breast tissue, and those at increased risk for breast cancer," said study author Carrie Beth Hruska, a research fellow at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. "We have been working on the technology for the last six years. However, there are a lot of technical challenges that have had to be overcome, so it's still in the very early stages for use in patients."

In fact, MBI is currently only used in the context of research studies.

Hruska was to present her findings Thursday at the Department of Defense "Era of Hope" Breast Cancer Meeting, in Baltimore.

Mammography is still the standard and most reliable screening test for breast cancer, and is likely to remain so for some time. But, mammography may be less effective in women who are at high risk for the disease or who have dense breasts (the two groups tend to overlap).

Last year, the American Cancer Society issued recommendations that women at high risk for breast cancer (such as those with the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutation or a strong family history of the disease) have annual MRIs in addition to mammography.

MRIs have "high sensitivity," meaning they pick up a lot of unusual spots in the breast, but those spots aren't always malignant. And MRI screening is costly.

"MRI is very expensive, highly sensitive and not specific, so there are a number of false-positives," explained Dr. Jay Brooks, chairman of hematology/oncology at Ochsner Health System in Baton Rouge, La.

Hruska said, "The jury is still out as to whether to recommend MRIs for women with dense breasts."

MBI is based on an intravenous injection of a radio "tracer" that circulates throughout the body and is preferentially taken up by cells that are more active than normal, such as cancer cells.

"We can then see this tracer with a special gamma camera we call the MBI system," Hruska explained. "This camera basically detects the gamma rays that are emitted from the tracer and, if there is more tracer, that's where the cancer is located." MBI is not affected by breast density and costs four-to-six times less than an MRI exam in both breasts, Hruska added.

In 48 patients suspected of having breast cancer who had undergone both MBI and breast MRI within a 30-day period, both MBI and MRI picked up disease in 47 of the 48 patients. In the final patient, two cancers went undetected by MBI but were picked up by MRI.

In all, 54 cancers in 32 patients were diagnosed. MRI picked up 53 cancers in 31 patients (a sensitivity of 98 percent) while MBI found 51 cancers in 30 patients (a sensitivity of 94 percent). One cancer was not diagnosed by MRI, MBI, mammography or ultrasound.

"It's a very interesting abstract and presentation," Brooks said. "It was a small number of patients, but it definitely bears looking at. This would be an interesting adjunct and maybe something worth looking into in the future with larger numbers of patients."

A second study, this one presented at the annual meeting of the Society of Nuclear Medicine in New Orleans recently, found that a custom-built scanner combining both positron emission tomography (PET) and computed tomography (CT) technologies might enhance current breast-imaging abilities. The technology may one day help with more personalized treatment options and could help determine if therapies with certain drugs are actually working in specific patients, said the authors, from the University of California-Davis in Sacramento.

More information

Visit the American Cancer Society   for more on early detection of breast cancer.

THURSDAY, June 26 (HealthDay News) -- Women tend to miss almost half their menopause-related hot flashes, which are associated with memory problems, according to a University of Illinois at Chicago study that included 29 women with moderate to severe hot flashes.

The women wore monitors that measured skin changes during a hot flash. Both subjective (self-reported) and objective (detected by the monitor) hot flashes were recorded over 24 hours. The average number of objective hot flashes was 19.5 per day, about 40 percent more than were reported by the women.

The researchers also measured the women's memory. Previous research has shown that about 40 percent of middle-aged women report forgetfulness.

"When we looked at the relationship between the hot flashes that the women truly had -- that is, the hot flashes that the monitor picked up -- and memory performance on the cognitive tests, we found a very strong relationship. So, the more true hot flashes a woman had, the worse her memory performance," lead author Pauline Maki, an associate professor of psychiatry and psychology, said in a prepared statement.

"In other words, the hot flash-memory relationship is not all in a woman's head. It's actually a physiological relationship that you can pick up on, if you measure hot flashes objectively with a monitor."

The researchers also noted a link between the total number of hours of sleep and memory performance the next day.

"The total number of hours slept predicted worse memory performance, but also the total number of hot flashes during the night when a woman was sleeping predicted memory dysfunction," Maki said. "So, the two together worsen memory in women the next day."

She said the findings suggest that treating vasomotor symptoms in women with hot flashes may improve their memory.

The study was published online in Menopause and was expected to be in the September/October print issue.

More information

The National Institute on Aging has more about menopause  .

MONDAY, June 23 (HealthDay News) -- Women can protect themselves against death from heart disease and other causes by sticking with a diet that is low in saturated fats and sugar and high in vegetables, fruits and whole grains, a new study suggests.

"We investigated a Western eating pattern -- lots of red and processed meat, French fries, refined grains and sweets -- and a prudent pattern -- lots of fruit, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, fish and poultry -- in relation to mortality," explained study author Christin Heidemann, who conducted her research while in the department of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston. She is now a research scientist in the department of epidemiology at the German Institute of Human Nutrition in Nuthetal.

"[Women] with a high adherence to the prudent pattern had a 17 percent lower long-term risk of premature death from all causes, and a 28 percent lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease, compared to women with a low adherence to this pattern," Heidemann noted.

The findings were expected to be published in the July 15 issue of Circulation.

The researchers noted that what they defined as a prudent diet closely reflects dietary recommendations from the American Heart Association that target all healthy men and women, including taking steps to: limit saturated fats, cholesterol, and sodium; to lower sugar consumption; to eat fish twice weekly; to eat more fruits, vegetables, whole-grain and high-fiber foods; and to eat fat-free and low-fat dairy products.

The results mirror earlier reports such as one out of the University of Minnesota's School of Public Health that was published in Circulation earlier this year that also suggested a Western diet can compromise overall health.

In that earlier study of 10,000 Americans, a diet heavy in red meat, fried foods and refined grains was found to be associated with a higher risk for heart problems and diabetes via the development of the so-called metabolic syndrome. In that case, the finding applied to both men and women.

In the current effort, Heidemann and her team gleaned its observations from an analysis of the eating habits of more than 72,000 women who had participated in the Nurse's Health Study between 1984 and 2002.

All the women were between the ages of 30 and 55, and most were white. Prior to participation, none had any history of heart attack, angina, coronary-artery surgery, diabetes or cancer.

The authors sifted through five food questionnaires that had been completed every two to four years during the study period. The data concerned both portion sizes and frequency of consumption with respect to 116 different food items. In turn, foods were categorized as belonging to either a prudent or a Western diet.

Information was also collected regarding age, body weight and mass, blood pressure, supplement usage and physical activity routines.

Older women, those who exercised more, and those taking multivitamins and/or hormone replacement therapy were more likely to consume a prudent diet. By contrast, less active younger women who were more likely to smoke and less likely to take supplements were found more likely to have consumed a Western diet.

By the study's conclusion, just over 6,000 women had died: 1,154 from heart disease, 3,139 from cancer, and 1,718 from other causes.

With regard to both heart disease and death from all causes, consumption of a prudent diet was associated with a lower incidence of death compared with consumption of a Western diet.

High adherence to a Western diet was associated with a 22 percent higher risk of death from heart disease, a 21 percent higher risk of death from all causes, and a 16 percent higher risk of death from cancer.

Although a prudent diet was linked to a lower risk for death from cancer, the association was deemed not significant after accounting for other lifestyle and health factors.

"The results highlight the importance of intensifying efforts to promote the adoption of a healthy diet," Heidemann said.

"Recommendations to prevent chronic diseases and promote longevity may need to focus on overall dietary patterns, rather than individual nutrients," she added.

Lona Sandon, an assistant professor of clinical nutrition of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, said the finding is a no-brainer.

"If you eat your fruits and vegetables and whole grains, we know that that enhances health," she said. "And so, this is just another study to convince you that healthy eating does make a difference. Healthy eating does add years to your life."

"And I think women in particular should perk up at this study," Sandon added, "because there is still this notion that women don't die of heart disease. But the fact is, they do. And clearly, in terms of heart disease risk, diet makes a difference."

More information

For more on women's health and dietary needs, go to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

MONDAY, June 9 (HealthDay News) -- Trouble in your marriage can cause trouble in bed, but not necessarily the kind of trouble that first comes to mind.

New research has found that women in happy marriages tend to sleep more soundly than women in unhappy marriages. In fact, women with good marriages have about 10 percent greater odds of getting a decent night of shut-eye compared to women who aren't happy with their spouse.

"Marriage can be good for your sleep if it's a happy one. But, being in an unhappy marriage can be a risk factor for sleep disturbance," said the study's lead author, Wendy M. Troxel, a psychologist at the University of Pittsburgh.

The million-dollar question, Troxel said, is which comes first -- does the unhappy marriage lead to poor sleep, or does poor sleep contribute to a bad marriage?

"We have future studies planned, and we need to tease that out," she said. "If you're not sleeping, you're more irritable, have lower frustration and tolerance levels, so it's possible that could affect the marriage. But we suspect it's in the other direction," that the bad marriage is affecting the quality of sleep because you're trying to sleep next to someone you may be fighting with, and that's stressful.

"If you're stressed or anxious, it can have an effect on your sleep," agreed Dr. Ana Krieger, director of the New York University Sleep Disorders Center in New York City.

Troxel and her colleagues reviewed data on about 2,000 married women who participated in the Study of Women's Health Across the Nation (SWAN). The women were an average age of 46 years. Just over half were white, 20 percent were black, 9 percent were Hispanic, 9 percent were Chinese, and 11 percent were Japanese.

All of the women reported their sleep quality, the state of their marriage, how often they had difficulty falling asleep, if they stayed asleep, and how early they woke up.

Happily married women had less trouble getting to sleep, had fewer sleep complaints, had more restful sleep and were less likely to wake up early or awaken in the middle of the night than women whose marriages were less than ideal.

Even after the researchers adjusted the data to account for other factors known to disturb sleep, the researchers found that happily married women still slept more soundly. And, these findings appeared to hold up across racial lines. The only groups that the findings weren't statistically significant for were Chinese and Japanese women, but Troxel suspects this may be because there weren't as many Chinese or Japanese women in the study as white and black women.

Troxel was expected to present her findings June 9 at Associated Professional Sleep Societies annual meeting, in Baltimore.

"All marriages aren't created equal, and having a high quality marriage may be good for sleep, whereas an unhealthy marriage is a potent source of stress. You could be sleeping with the object of your hostility," Troxel said.

If you have a lot of stress from your marriage or another source, such as your job, Krieger said you need to try to fix the situation that is causing the anxiety. If you can't change the stressful situation, she recommended trying to change how you perceive the stress. Good ways to help you relax are meditation and yoga, she said.

Troxel said that if you're in an unhappy marriage, marriage therapy -- or individual therapy if your spouse won't go to therapy -- can be helpful.

She also recommended practicing good sleep habits, such as going to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time every day.

More information

Get more advice on getting a good night's sleep from the National Sleep Foundation  .