Should I be screened for lung cancer?
Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: Overdiagnosis What is cancer overdiagnosis? William Black defines an overdiagnosed cancer as one which “will never cause symptoms or kill”. This idea is hard for most people to grasp. Popular understanding is that lung cancer is a relentless disease that will rapidly kill unless it is treated. If …
Continue reading “Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: Overdiagnosis and Overtreatment”
Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: False Positives The basic problem in lung cancer screening is that cancers and benign nodules look the same. With some exceptions, a radiologist cannot tell a cancer from a benign nodule just by looking at them. A false positive test is a positive test report in a patient who …
Continue reading “Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: False Positives”
Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: False Negatives A false negative exam occurs when a person has a lung cancer, but the CT scan fails to report a positive test result. Are there false negatives in CT lung cancer screening? Yes. False negative screening tests are possible if the lung cancer is very small …
Continue reading “Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: False Negatives”
Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: “License to Smoke” Multiple prospective and retrospective research studies have looked at the question of whether people who smoke decide not to quit smoking, because CT screening will prevent them from dying from lung cancer. There is general agreement that there is no evidence that quit rates are lower …
Continue reading “Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: “License to Smoke””
Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: Expense Is CT screening expensive? It depends on your medical insurance coverage. If you have insurance coverage with Medicare, Medicaid or a private company and meet Medicare eligibility requirements, -age between 55-80 – smoked 30 or more pack/years. (For example one pack/day for 30 years or 2 packs/day for …
Continue reading “Potential complications of lung cancer screening: Expense”
Potential complications of Lung Cancer Screening: Inconvenience The first step in getting a screening CT scan is to get a prescription from your healthcare primary provider (doctor, nurse practitioner or physician assistant). Medicare requires that you review a decision aid document or other media and then discuss potential benefits and risks of screening with your …
Continue reading “Potential complications of lung cancer screening: Inconvenience”
Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: Discomfort: Is a CT scan for lung cancer screening uncomfortable? No. When you get to the clinic or hospital where the CT scan will be done, you will have to register and provide medical insurance information. When you are taken to the CT scanning room, You will not …
Continue reading “Potential Complications of Lung Cancer Screening: Discomfort”
What is “screening” in medicine? Screening is based upon the simple idea that results of treatment of a disease are better – i.e. lower chance of death, faster recovery, fewer complications, less disability, less expense – when disease has been diagnosed at an early stage, before it has caused permanent damage. There are many ways to …
What are the potential complications of lung cancer screening? Current publications on lung cancer screening conclude that complications of screening are relatively minor and are outweighed by benefits. Nevertheless, Medicare regulations insist that those who want to be screened must be provided with information on a long list of possible complications. Why? By the early …
Continue reading “What are to potential risks and complications of CT screening for lung cancer?”
The web page is designed to serve as a decision aid in shared decision making for lung cancer screening. What is shared decision making? Shared decision making is a relatively new concept in medicine that goes beyond what was previously known as “informed consent”. The idea behind it is, idealistically, a good one; that …