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A comment on Half of women will get a false positive 3D mammogram, study finds. Parent comment

Re:Half of women will get a false positive 3D mammogram, stu... by dmurray on Friday March 25, 2022 @05:30PM (#30807236)
> For many real tests, getting a false positive once predicts a higher chance of getting another false positive in a repeated test.

Almost all of them, in fact. If improving accuracy was as easy as repeating the test, the doctors would just be told that the correct procedure for this test is to take three readings.

You can expect that this is untrue only if the tests are especially expensive or invasive.

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Re:Half of women will get a false positive 3D mammogram, stu... by HWR_14 on Friday March 25, 2022 @06:01PM (#30807432)
I believe repeating the test is standard procedure for many tests - if the first one is positive. However the repetitions are usually temporally separated (in some cases intentionally, in others because the test takes time.) This is effective in those cases because although there are a lot of temporary causes for a false positive to spike, there are fewer where it's persistent.
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