Global breast attenuation:control group and benign breast diseases.

This paper deals with the estimation of the slope of attenuation in human breast tissue. The measurement is done in the reflection mode with a short time Fourier analysis. All important factors such as diffraction effect, tissue depth and specular reflectors are taken into account. A population of 49 normal women shows large inter-individual variations of the attenuation coefficient. A multiple linear regression allows correlation of this variation with the duration of the woman's genital life and pregnancies. A preliminary study is done on 10 benign diffuse breast diseases and shows a weak correlation with the type of the breast: normal or pathological. The utility of the quantification is discussed for one case of large fibrocystic disease.