Do cancer screening exams really extend patients' lives?

In what is sure to be a controversial study among cancer screening advocates...Read more on AuntMinnie.comRelated Reading: Destounis talks rising cancer rates with AuntMinnie.com Breast, lung cancer incidence to rise due to COVID screening delays Report: Cancer rates decline, yet disparities loom Female veterans deployed post-9/11 have lower breast cancer rates Pandemic may have caused shift toward late-stage breast cancersComments: 8/28/2023 12:12:18 PMDr Dan Kopans It is time for the "non-science" to stop (actually it is long overdue).  It is unclear how papers such as this pass peer review.  The Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT) of breast cancer screening have proven that early detection saves lives.  There were statistically significantly fewer women ages 40-74 who died from breast cancer in these trials. The present paper apparently tried to evaluate the effect that fewer breast cancer deaths had on overall, "all cause", mortality – deaths from “all causes”.  This clearly ignores the fact that, although it is the most common non-cutaneous cancer among women, breast cancer still accounts for only 3% of all deaths each year.  If you reduce breast cancer deaths by 30% this means that you would reduce “all-cause” mortality by 1%.  Tabar showed years ago that it would take an RCT of more than 2 million women to show that reducing breast cancer deaths by 30%, statistically, significantly, reduces all-cause mortality (Tabar L...
Source: AuntMinnie.com Headlines - Category: Radiology Source Type: news