“There is only one cancer screening test that has definitively been proven to help people live longer: lung cancer screening in heavy smokers,” writes Prof. H. Gilbert Welch, MD in his most recent book Less Medicine, More Health: 7 Assumptions That Drive Too Much Medical Care.

(It is from Chapter 3 / Assumption #3: Sooner Is Always Better: Disturbing truth: Early diagnosis can needlessly turn people into patients, under the section titled “Does Screening Save Lives?”)

“Why?

“Because heavy smokers face a twenty- to thirty-fold [20- to 30-fold] increased risk of lung cancer death.

“In other words, for heavy smokers, lung cancer is a big component of their overall death rate.”

To say this another way…

• Breast cancer screening has not been shown to reduce the total risk of death over some number of years
• Prostate cancer screening has not been been shown to reduce the total risk of death over some number of years
• Colon cancer screening has not been been shown to reduce the total risk of death over some number of years
• Oral cancer screening has not been been shown to reduce the total risk of death over some number of years
• Screening for other cancers has not been been shown to reduce the total risk of death over some number of years

He started the chapter by saying, “THIS CHAPTER MAY CHALLENGE your assumptions about screening—specifically, cancer screening.”

Prof. H. Gilbert Welch, MD is also the author of the wonderful book Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick In Pursuit Of Health which is about the same topic as this book, the topic of over-diagnosis and over-treatment which does NOT help people live longer.

The reason that I feel passionately about this is because my mother suffered tragically from drug-induced side effects which her doctors were blind to.

It is along the same lines as Prof. Welch’s books which look at the effects of of over-diagnosis and over-treatment.

Screening for colon cancer (fecal occult-blood testing), either every year or every other year, did NOT reduce the total risk of death after a 30 year followup according to a recent analysis of the Minnesota Colon Cancer Control Study.

The percentage of people who had died from any cause after a 30-year follow-up was exactly the same in each group (71% of people had died in each group).

• 71% of people had died in those screened for colon cancer every year for 11 years
• 71% of people had died in those screened for colon cancer every other year, a total of 6 times
• 71% of people had died in those who were NOT screened for colon cancer

Prof. H. Gilbert Welch, MD writes about this in his most recent book Less Medicine, More Health: 7 Assumptions That Drive Too Much Medical Care.

He is also the author of the wonderful book Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick In Pursuit Of Health which is about the same topic as this book, the topic of over-diagnosis and over-treatment which does NOT help people live longer.

The reason that I feel passionately about this is because my mother suffered tragically from drug-induced side effects which her doctors were blind to.

It is along the same lines as Prof. Welch’s books which look at the effects of of over-diagnosis and over-treatment.