Men Overdiagnosed For Prostate Cancer
OTTAWA — More than one million American men have gone through needless treatment for prostate cancer since the PSA test became common more than 20 years ago, a medical journal study says.
And the study’s author says Canadian men face the same problem of “overdiagnosis,” causing them to have surgery and radiation treatment that can cause impotence, incontinence and pain.
This doesn’t mean diagnosing cancer where none exists, says the study and editorial in Monday’s Journal of the National Cancer Institute. It means that many men had a form of cancer that could have been left alone safely…
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“Many people don’t understand the human cost of being overdiagnosed — being told you have cancer” even though “that cancer will never cause symptoms or death in your lifetime. We don’t know which patients are overdiagnosed, so we treat them all…
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even the European study shows “substantial overdiagnosis,” he says. “More than 1,400 men have to be screened and 48 additional men diagnosed and treated to avert one prostate cancer death.”
He adds: “Prostate cancer screening has resulted in substantial overdiagnosis and unnecessary treatment. It may have saved relatively few lives .
More @ http://www.calgaryherald.com/health/overdiagnosed+prostate+cancer+Study/1948700/story.html
Cannabis and Prostate cancer
It is widely known in the medical communities (where these blunders, such as over-diagnosis of prostate cancer are perpertrated on humanity) that medicinal marijuana is a viable preventive treatment alternatives for persons at the risk of developing conditions such as prostate. It is also good for those who already have the condition as reports have shown that cannabis is also effective in treating prostate cancer.