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Originally Posted by godfry
Prostate cancer screening has been implicated as one of the more glaring generators of unnecessary surgeries in traditional medicine. Overtreatment.
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I find that an odd position since it has saved lives
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"Since 1992 (the year after publication of my paper showing that PSA could be used as a first-line screening test for prostate cancer), rates of death from prostate cancer have fallen 37% in the US, more than for any other cancer in men or women," he said.
Dr Catalona noted that while the prostate cancer deaths are down significantly, there is now a decrease in screening which has resulted in a decreased incidence rate of prostate cancer.
"I think the reason for this finding of decreased incidence is that there is less PSA screening due in part to recent anti-screening propaganda. 52% of men 50 or older reported having a PSA test in 2004, down from 58 percent in 2001," he said.
He finds this decrease in prostate cancer screening alarming because he sees the decrease in deaths from prostate cancer clearly connected to early detection from PSA and DRE screening. More incidence, more early detection, could mean more lowering of death rates from prostate cancer. Drop in Prostate Cancer Mortality Rates During PSA Screening Era
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137 deaths due to prostate cancer occurred between 1989 and 1996, inclusively, in the 38,056 unscreened men while only 5 deaths were observed among the 8,137 screened individuals. The prostate cancer death rates during the eight-year period were 48.7 and 15 per 100,000 man-years in the unscreened and screened groups, respectively, for a 3.25 odds ratio in favor of screening and early treatment (P < 0.01). http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9973093
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