Scott Allen of the Boston Globe wrote an important story, "Cancer scares grow as screening rises." Excerpt:
"For every cancer survivor, there are several "cancer scare survivors" ... who have been told, based on imperfect tests, that they may have cancer when they do not.False alarms are not only stressful, but they also often force patients to undergo uncomfortable follow-up tests or even surgery, only to discover that they are cancer-free. Doctors perform an estimated 2 million biopsies, in which a needle is inserted to extract a tissue sample, on healthy breasts in women and prostate glands in men each year because of suspicious test results.
In one study, more than 500 women with no symptoms of ovarian cancer underwent unnecessary abdominal surgery because a blood test wrongly suggested they had the disease.
Unfortunately, in a nation where "early detection" is a mantra and where new high-tech screening tests are being promoted for lung and breast cancer, despite high error rates, it is increasingly possible that everyone will experience a cancer scare."