Sabee Molloi, professor of radiological sciences at UC Irvine, will partner with Dr. Carlos Iribarren, a research scientist from Kaiser Permanente, to assess whether breast arterial calcification detected by mammography can be used to gauge cardiovascular disease risk.
The two have received a $6.8 million grant from the National Heart, Lung & Blood Institute to study mammography-identified calcium buildup in breast arteries in more than 5,000 African American, Latino, Asian and white women at three Kaiser Permanente medical centers in Northern California. The researchers will test whether these calcifications correlate with several cardiovascular disease risk factors.
A technique to accurately measure breast arterial calcium mass was developed in Molloi’s laboratory.