Are you at a higher risk of breast cancer?

(WCIV) — In South Carolina, women are required to be notified by letter if they have dense breast tissue.

But what do women do with this information?

Almost half of all women over the age of 40 have dense breast tissue, according to densebreast-info.org.

For these women, mammograms can fail to detect tumors. They also have a higher risk of getting cancer and that cancer going undetected, meaning additional screenings are essential to rule out breast cancer.

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This can be done preferably by MRI or by ultrasound.

“Mammogram alone- we find maybe out of 1,000 women who have a screening mammogram, we should find about five cancers. If we add an MRI- we will find another 10 or 15 more cancers the first year, and then another seven cancers every year after that," says radiologist Dr. Wendie Berg.

According to the National Cancer Institute, mammograms miss about 20% of breast cancers.

Now, the positive thing is, cancers typically found in an MRI are smaller and are easily treated.

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Right now, South Carolina does not require insurance to cover those additional screenings, so costs can vary depending on the testing done.

However, ultrasounds are typically less expensive than MRIs.