Nobody wants to get cancer. But early screening is one of many medical practices of rather limited value. This is one of many such covered in Malcolm Kendrick's "Doctoring Data: How to sort out medical advice from medical nonsense." "Survival" in cancer treatment is defined as at least five years remission. To exaggerate the benefit of s…
Nobody wants to get cancer. But early screening is one of many medical practices of rather limited value. This is one of many such covered in Malcolm Kendrick's "Doctoring Data: How to sort out medical advice from medical nonsense." "Survival" in cancer treatment is defined as at least five years remission. To exaggerate the benefit of screening, it relies on the fact the many cancers are very slow growing. So if (say) prostate cancer is detected early, happily for the medical business, it can be "treated" with drugs and surgery. Yes, it's likely the treated patient will still be alive in 5 years. But it's almost as likely that he would have been, even if he'd never been tested.
None of the above is to say that screening, or of course that all medical treatment is useless. But it's a "dirty little secret" that many drugs/treatments are at best of limited value and often have undisclosed (or unknown) downsides. Already on my list of suspects are: statins, flu and pneumonia vaccines and ... well, there's a lot to investigate.
Like it or not,t hey are in business to make money first. The patient's health is incidental.
Yes, I read H. Gilbert Welch's book on cancer testing which has similar information as Kendrick's. (I didn't know Kendrick had such a book. I know about his books on statins). That kind of thing upset the medical hierarchy so much that they forced him out at Dartmouth for supposed plagiarism.
Nobody wants to get cancer. But early screening is one of many medical practices of rather limited value. This is one of many such covered in Malcolm Kendrick's "Doctoring Data: How to sort out medical advice from medical nonsense." "Survival" in cancer treatment is defined as at least five years remission. To exaggerate the benefit of screening, it relies on the fact the many cancers are very slow growing. So if (say) prostate cancer is detected early, happily for the medical business, it can be "treated" with drugs and surgery. Yes, it's likely the treated patient will still be alive in 5 years. But it's almost as likely that he would have been, even if he'd never been tested.
None of the above is to say that screening, or of course that all medical treatment is useless. But it's a "dirty little secret" that many drugs/treatments are at best of limited value and often have undisclosed (or unknown) downsides. Already on my list of suspects are: statins, flu and pneumonia vaccines and ... well, there's a lot to investigate.
Like it or not,t hey are in business to make money first. The patient's health is incidental.
Yes, I read H. Gilbert Welch's book on cancer testing which has similar information as Kendrick's. (I didn't know Kendrick had such a book. I know about his books on statins). That kind of thing upset the medical hierarchy so much that they forced him out at Dartmouth for supposed plagiarism.