Overdiagnosis: How cancer screening can turn indolentpathology into illness

TY - JOUR

T1 - Overdiagnosis

T2 - How cancer screening can turn indolentpathology into illness

AU - Brodersen, J.

AU - Schwartz, L.M.

AU - Woloshin, S.

PY - 2014/8

Y1 - 2014/8

N2 - The shift from illness to disease has had a profound impact on modern medicine - particularly in the realm of cancer screening. In screening, it is not patients with illness who seek help from the healthcare system; it is asymptomatic healthy individuals who are invited into the healthcare system to be examined for pathology. The underlying assumption of screening is that abnormalities and pathology always progress. If this were true, it would always make sense to look for disease even when people feel well. The million (or more accurately multi-billion) dollar question is whether the fundamental assumption that disease invariably leads to illness is valid. This is the question that the present paper will try to explore and answer.

AB - The shift from illness to disease has had a profound impact on modern medicine - particularly in the realm of cancer screening. In screening, it is not patients with illness who seek help from the healthcare system; it is asymptomatic healthy individuals who are invited into the healthcare system to be examined for pathology. The underlying assumption of screening is that abnormalities and pathology always progress. If this were true, it would always make sense to look for disease even when people feel well. The million (or more accurately multi-billion) dollar question is whether the fundamental assumption that disease invariably leads to illness is valid. This is the question that the present paper will try to explore and answer.

KW - ILLNESS

KW - pathology

KW - semrap-2014-2

U2 - 10.1111/apm.12278

DO - 10.1111/apm.12278

M3 - Review

C2 - 24862511

SN - 0903-465X

VL - 122

SP - 683

EP - 689

JO - APMIS. Supplementum

JF - APMIS. Supplementum

IS - 8

ER -