Women should undergo regular, annual screening mammography beginning at age 45, instead of the current recommendation of age 40, according to an updated guideline on breast cancer screening released Tuesday by the American Cancer Society (ACS).

Women aged 55 years and older should transition to biennial, instead of annual, screening. In addition, clinical breast examination is not recommended for breast cancer screening among average-risk women at any age.

The recommendations, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, updated the ACS's breast cancer screening guideline in 2003.

The new guideline also gave women the option of starting annual screening as early as age 40 and recommended that women 55 years and older should have the opportunity to continue screening annually.

"After careful examination of the burden of disease among women aged 40 to 54 years, the guideline development group concluded that the lesser, but not insignificant, burden of disease for women aged 40 to 44 years and the higher cumulative risk of adverse outcomes no longer warranted a direct recommendation to begin screening at age 40 years," the ACS wrote.

"In conclusion, the ACS recommendations are made in the context of maximizing reductions in breast cancer mortality and reducing years of life lost while minimizing the associated harms among the population of women in the United States," it added.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women worldwide. In the United States, it is estimated that approximately 230,000 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015.

Even though death from breast cancer has declined steadily since 1990, largely due to improvements in early detection and treatment, an estimated 40,300 women in the US will die of breast cancer in 2015.

Early detection is associated with reduced breast cancer illness and death, according to background information in the paper.