All Life Insurance Tips

Is screening for cancer a giant con job?

Here's an article in the NYT about people who are diagnosed with cancer in midlife, and the trials they face after beating cancer. Many of them are impoverished, even driven into bankruptcy, by the high cost of their treatment and medications. Many of them survive cancer only to find out that doing so has made them unemployable. Employers, acting in their own rational self-interest, will not hire someone who hs had cancer, since they are afraid that person will drive up their health insurance costs. But hey, it's better than being dead, right? Now here comes the astounding part: "“Cancer used to be a disease that occurred after you retired, because that’s when you were diagnosed,” said Cathy J. Bradley, a health economist at Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center who has studied employment among cancer patients. “Now patients are getting that diagnosis early on, which is a good thing. . . .But I don’t think they or their employers are prepared for the tradeoff, which is that someone may be out of work for a long time.” In other words: these people had their lives ruined by being diagnosed with "cancers" which, according to the article, never would have bothered them until they were at the end of their lives anyway! The word "cancer" is one of the most emotionally laden words in the English language, but when a pathologist uses the word "cancer," all she means is a tiny growth of abnormal-looking cells, which may or may not be harmful. There is no evidence that getting screened for cancer helps people to live longer. The whole idea of screening for cancer was based on the hope -- that's all it ever was, a hope -- that there were cancers that were so deadly that by the time symptoms appeared, it was too late to do anything about it, BUT, which if detected sooner by the new imaging technology, could be successfully treated. There is no evidence that such cancers even exist. What we do know is that, if they do exist, they must be so rare as not to make a difference in survival rates. What screening for cancer does do is detect the presence of tiny "cancers" which never would have harmed the patient. And, as the article makes clear, a diagnosis of cancer can ruin your life. So is screening for cancer a giant con job? Cancer Survivors Struggle to Find Jobs, Study Finds" by Roni Caryn Rabin http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/18/health/18cancer.html?_r=1&ref=health Should I Be Tested for Cancer? Maybe Not and Here's Why by H. Gilbert Welch, MD, MPH http://www.amazon.com/Should-Be-Tested-Cancer-Maybe/dp/0520248368/ref=pd_bbs_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234995311&sr=8-1 Worried Sick: a Prescription for Health in Overtreated America by Nortin M Hadler, MD http://www.amazon.com/Worried-Sick-Prescription-Overtreated-America/dp/0807831875/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234995363&sr=1-1 A third-generation freethinker To Midnight Moon: You wrote: "I do know the earlier the better medically for the patient." Do you have any EVIDENCE for this, or is it something you just assume? ? You know, the five-year survival rate for prostate cancer (survival rate after detection) is 90%. In the UK, it's 40%. That would seem to be a point in favor of our health-care system, until you realize that the death rate for prostate cancer is EXACTLY THE SAME in both countries. There are two possible interpretations for this: 1) People are being diagnosed earlier, but dying at the same time, in which case the screening is useless, and/or 2) People are being diagnosed and treated for "cancers" that never would have bothered them. Either way, there is no evidence that agressive screening of asymptomatic patients saves lives. Prostatectomy can leave a man incontinent, impotent, or both. That's a hell of a price to pay for something that never would have bothered a person in his lifetime. To charna: If I have symptoms, I will have them checked out. I will not submit to screening when I have no symptoms. That is literally looking for trouble.

Public Comments

1. HMMM i have no idea. but it is thought provoking isnt it?
2. I dont know about all the technical stuff such as how early some cancers can be detected, but I do know the earlier the better medically for the patient. I have answered your posts before, and you may know that I had my life ruined early by cancer. I was 21 and then 23. And right now, at 25, yes, I am unemployable. No one's insurance will cover the meds I need to survive, and during my first remission when I was searching for a job I found the more honest I was about my medical history the less likely I was to be called back. You are right, its a hassle and a risk for employers. They have insurance costs to worry about, but not just that... What if I relapse? Will all the money they just spent on training me be wasted if I have to quit? Are they willing to work around my doc apts? And then, lets not forget everything else cancer took from me. I am obese now because of the high dose steroids, I will never be able to have my own children, everytime my hair gets to a length I like I end up loosing it again, I have no money, no savings, cant get a job, my credit was ruined, the list goes on. However.... I actually would be dead right now had my cancer not been detected and treated. That is medical fact. Yes, cancer took a LOT away from me, but it gave me a lot too. Since I cant work, I am going back to school. My sig other makes enough money so that we can atleast live (albeit pay check to pay check), and I am getting an education that I never would have been able to do had I not had cancer. Things happen that ruin, disrupt and change our lives. If its not cancer, its something else. A falling out with family, a divorce, lay offs, bad financial decisions, huricanes, earth quakes, fires, that list goes on, many of which are out of our own control. We have to fight and adapt no matter what the situation is. I think things that make us healthier is always good. As far as early screening.... It should be available to those who want it. As far as the problems that arises that are not medically related such as insurance and employment... This is where I think laws need to catch up with technology instead of people being afraid of and avoiding the screening. Our medical insurance system needs a complete infrastructure change anyways, new laws need to be made and enforced to prevent employers from discriminating because of medical diagnosis, and we need more jobs period.
3. Okay. I get what you are saying but let me pose this question to you: If you went to the doctor for a physical and he found a mass on your testicle and said that it could be cancerous would you have it biopsied to find out? Lets say you do and unfortunately it is cancer and it is starting to spread through your entire testicle - do you have it removed or leave it alone so that it can later kill you? Let me know. I have had abnormal cells removed and I'm very pleased that I did. However, they came back and - probably quite foolishly, I decided to let nature run its course - survival of the fittest.