Two TV health segments that I'm sure were well-intentioned both caught my eye this week for how they might lead viewers to obsess about still another score, still another test result, still another number that they don't fully understand.
The CBS Early Show had a series entitled, "Early Intervention: Cardiac Arrest." Their reporter went around to food courts in shopping malls "seeking people eating unhealthy foods, or who were overweight, or who had other potentially problematic signs, and offered to check out their heart disease risk. They agreed to undergo CT scans to help assess their heart health. The doctors checked the images the scans produced for signs of calcium, which indicates the presence of artery-clogging plaque."
Before it was all over, the series made it sound like most of us should be running in for a CT scan and that we should certainly know our "calcium score" - a test result that was drummed into viewers over and over. Only briefly did I hear the caveat that these tests are only for people with risk factors including a family history of heart disease. But the caveat was rushed and unclear. CBS' website even states:
If you live in the Memphis area and want to have a scan to check on the calcium levels in your cardiac arteries, call (901) xxx-xxxx. (I have no intention of furthering the promotion by providing the phone number as CBS did.)
That sounds like an all-out invitation to all viewers, doesn't it?
Then CNN's Housecall program this weekend reported on one of the many tests being developed to screen for early Alzheimer's disease. The story said:
"Researchers are hoping to get the Detect system into doctor's offices as early as this fall. It will be used as an early screening tool starting around the ages of 45 to 50. The goal here would be to get a baseline of your cognitive skills early on, so doctors can act early if a drop in score is detected."
Well, sure they're hoping to get it into doctor's office this fall to start screening everyone around 45-50. What a huge new market. And let's get hundreds of thousands of more Americans worrying now about their baseline "cognitive skills score" or whatever it would be called. Meantime, there was no discussion of the sensitivity or specificity of the test. It was still another example of accepting claims about a new screening test without exploring any of the pitfalls, the downsides, the things that come from such screening that can have harmful effects on peoples' lives.
Calcium scores and cognitive skills scores: two more things to worry about, two more ways to promote fear in all of us and to "sell sickness." And two more examples of journalists not asking enough tough questions.
There's an old line that the only well person left in America is simply someone who hasn't been tested enough. Because the more you look, the more you'll find.
Posted by schwitz at February 17, 2008 09:08 AM | TrackBackI was going to write you to comment on this story, but I now forget what I was going to say. So maybe I should be asking my doctor to send me for screening for ...uh, what was it again? Oh yes, early Alzheimer's disease....
Posted by: Alan Cassels at February 18, 2008 04:54 PMA couple of months ago I also got a promotional flyer from a newly opened local radiology lab in a Small Town, NY. It included a special of three imaging tests - CT scan for heart desease, a test to check for aortic aneurism (if I remember correctly) and one other test I don't remember. None of them recommended. The flyer included an appropriately scary description of the conditions as well as the usual "silent killer" designation and the virtues of early detection. All three tests for 100-something (or more). As I had roughtly the same amount of money designtated for a ticket to the Met, I decided to throw the flyer to the (paper) garbage can. I figured an evening at the Met will do wonders for my heart.
"Researchers have looked at marijuana as one way to stall to progression of Alzheimer's disease." How much you are willing to bet, this line will encourage some people to go and get the test?
Posted by: Diora at February 19, 2008 05:09 PMOne has to tread a fine line between taking full advantage of medical advances to optimise health and becoming obsessive with the same.
As is the case with most anything, the key is to avoid both extremes.
Posted by: Traducteur Private Equity at February 28, 2008 06:29 AMI use to think that the newest advances in health were always the better solution and after having a tooth removed decided to research dental implants, which are relatively new. After reading some of the horror stories it has really opened my eyes to why health care is a multi billion dollar market.
Posted by: Supplement Reviews at February 28, 2008 04:24 PMI am glad someone in journalism is still thinking and asking questions. Every story has to be looked at from at least two opposing sides or angles. Are we supposed to be a bunch of sheep and buy into whatever "news story" is force fed to us?
Health care in this country has become disease management (and big money). We have to get back to using commonsense and look at the causes of disease and prevent them rather than letting it happen.
Posted by: Tony Saldin at March 6, 2008 10:09 PM