Researchers reported Wednesday that mammograms can cut the breast cancer death rate by 26 percent for women in their 40s. But their results were greeted with skepticism by some experts who say they may have overestimated the benefit.
Last year the United States Preventive Services Task Force, an independent group that issues guidelines on cancer screening, questioning the benefit of screening women younger than 50.
The new study took advantage of circumstances in Sweden, where since 1986 some counties have offered mammograms to women in their 40s and others have not, according to the lead author, Hakan Jonsson, professor of cancer epidemiology at Umea University in Sweden.
The researchers compared breast cancer deaths in women who had a breast cancer diagnosis in counties that had screening with deaths in counties that did not. The rate was 26 percent lower in counties with screening.
Other experts were not convinced.
One problem, said Dr. Peter C. Gotzsche of the Nordic Cochrane Center in Copenhagen, a nonprofit group that reviews health care research, is that the investigators counted the number of women who received a diagnosis of breast cancer and also died of it. They did not compare the broader breast cancer death rates in the counties.
It is an important distinction, Dr. Gotzsche said, because screening finds many cancers that do not need to be treated or found early. With more harmless cancers being found in the screened group, it will look like the chance of surviving breast cancer is greater in that group. “The analysis is flawed,” he said.
The new study is here. This sounds like the controversy surrounding PSA screening for prostate cancer: screening finds a lot more cancers, but they may not all be lethal. You have to read up and talk to your doctor about your particular case.
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