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PSA tests - are they a waste of time, or even worse?
May 21, 2012 - 11:40pm
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Cancer screening disconnect: First breast, now prostatehttp://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health/new-health/health-news/cancer...
The reaction to come is easy to predict: It will be denounced and largely ignored, an echo of what occurred when similar recommendations were made about breast-cancer screening.
There is a powerful narrative among support groups and cancer survivors: Screening saves lives. Men with prostate cancer, like women with breast cancer before them, will be lining up to recount how they narrowly escaped death because their cancer was detected early and excised.
For the most part, it’s wishful thinking. And it demonstrates the growing gap between what screening (and science more generally) can offer, and what the risk-averse public wants it to be.
The scientific evidence for PSA screening is sparse, and that’s humbling.
And however much the new recommendation – that men not routinely undergo a blood test that measures a protein called prostate specific antigen – is disliked, it was based on a thorough review of the evidence, including two large studies published recently.