Overdiagnosis, Overtreatment, Your Biggest Health Threats

"Until tests can more accurately distinguish the rabbits from the turtles (not to mention the dodos — it’s now looking like some cancers detectable by screening may actually disappear or go extinct on their own), cancer screening may harm more people than it helps."(source infra)

The Case Against Early Cancer Detection | FiveThirtyEight: "....Early detection might remain a laudable goal if it caught some deadly cancers in time to make a difference and didn’t bother anyone. But it is bothering people. Tens of thousands of South Koreans have undergone surgical procedures for cancers that likely would never have threatened their lives, and the overdiagnosis/overtreatment problem exists to varying degrees for every cancer test. The problem gets worse, the more people you screen, as evidenced by the numbers for mammography and PSA [prostate] screening...."

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The Overdiagnosis of Cancer in America (video)

The Overdiagnosis of Cancer in America: "The Overdiagnosis of Cancer in America --9/14/2014-- 
The surge of cancer screening in the U.S. has increased the detection of precancerous lesions that are often low-risk. Some experts now argue that cancer is being overdiagnosed. WSJ’s Monika Auger reports."

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Mammography, Cancer, Overdiagnosis, False Positives, Overtreatment

One especially disturbing criticism is that screening mammography may lead to “overtreatment,” in which some women go through grueling therapies — surgery, radiation, chemotherapy — that they do not need. Indeed, some studies estimate that 19 percent or more of women whose breast cancers are found by mammography wind up being overtreated.(source infra)

Look for Cancer, and Find It - NYTimes.com: . . . . Overdiagnosis is not the same as a false positive result, in which a test like a mammogram initially suggests a problem but is proved wrong. False positives are frightening and expensive, but overtreatment is the potential harm of mammography that worries doctors most, according to an article published last week in The Journal of the American Medical Association. . . .(read more at links above)

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