Many complain but few actually read anything.
The Book: "Should I Be Tested For Cancer? Maybe Not And Here's Why"
The author: H. Gilbert Welch is Professor in the Department of Medicine and Community and Family Medicine At Dartmouth Medical School and Co-Director of the VA Outcomes Group in the Department of Veterans affairs. White River Junction, Vermont.
Being a professor in a medical school I think it's safe to assume that he teaches medical students. What could be more mainstream than that?
I highly recommend that everyone read his book and keep it handy as a reference. He doesn't advise anyone not to get tested, he simply explains the risks and rewards of being tested.
Often, the medical community, through associations like ACS, will promote testing by giving misleading statistics. They will say things like getting tested for a certain cancer will lower risk by 20%. But they never say 20% of what? They don't want to give the absolute number because it's small.
For example: It might be said that a certain test, like the fecal occult blood test, will lower the chances of dying by a third. That sounds like a lot, right? Wrong! Actually, in a study, they had to give 1,000 50 year old men fecal occult blood tests for 10 years to avoid one death. About 1/3 of them (333) would get false positives and be sent to get a colonoscopy. If one of them were to die from the colonoscopy, the net result would be: One life saved and one life lost. A draw.
But, normally, we wouldn't get to know that. That's because the one who died wouldn't be included in cancer statistics. That's because he didn't die from cancer he died from the colonoscopy.
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