Prostate cancer screening test may lead to overdiagnosis

Prostate cancer screening test may lead to overdiagnosis

Prostate cancer screening involves PSA (prostate specific antigen) blood tests which are said to detect the disease. But the reliability of the test has been called into question by some health experts.

A high PSA can mean prostate cancer, but can also be a sign of a benign enlargement of the prostate. Tumors can also grow slowly that they are unlikely to kill the patient. Meanwhile, there are cases of men who have prostate cancer but their PSA level is normal.

How fast the PSA level is increasing concerns physicians and patients said Dr. Andrew Vickers of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. So, they studied 5,519 men under a large prostate cancer study who ended up undergoing biopsies.

"Men show up here with a PSA of 2 and we say, 'Why are you here?' And they say, 'Well, I used to be a 1 and my doctor's worried. Am I going to die?"

The researchers then considered if PSA velocity influences the decision by doctors to perform a biopsy or not for this low-risk patients, and the conclusion is that it is not crucial. That means a slight increase in the PSA should not automatically warrant a biopsy. Current practice may have resulted to needless biopsies for low-risk men and the study findings may change that.

The study authors clarified that how fast PSA levels rise as a predictor for diagnosis was being called into question, not the actual PSA level itself. It means men with low PSA levels who see a rise in PSA levels should not worry because they do not necessarily need to get a biopsy.

The team said the value of the PSA level by itself is still considered a good factor in detecting prostate cancer.

Posted by George Daniels on Friday February 25 2011, 5:05 AM EST. Ref: AP. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Featured News, Health. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0