A roster of high-profile supporters, including sportsmen, actors, two former prime ministers and greater than 100 MPs, recently joined patient groups and charities in calling for a UK national prostate cancer screening programme.
However, the UK National Screening Committee (UKNSC) has announced this Draft decision Advising the federal government against routine population screening for all men. He has also dismissed calls for a particular screening program for black men as a result of “uncertainties” as a result of the shortage of clinical trials on this population group.
Instead, it really useful targeted screening every two years for a small proportion of men — those diagnosed between the ages of 45 and 61. BRCA1 or BRCA2 Gene mutation About three men in every 1,000 carry this gene variant and might develop fast-growing and more aggressive cancers at an early age.
Why such caution?
The UK Screening Committee commissioned the Sheffield Center for Health and Allied Research (SCHARR) to model the cost-effectiveness of prostate cancer screening. It considered screening all high-risk men, black men, men with a family history of cancer and BRCA carriers. His Preliminary results If screening BRCA carriers was essentially the most effective, and there was the best uncertainty about screening all at-risk men.
These results reflect limitations with the screening method. Evidence suggests that a typical blood test used for early detection, Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test, when used as A shouldn’t be as accurate Common screening tool.
The PSA test often fails to tell apart between cancers that cause serious illness and people who remain harmless for all times, resembling a benign enlargement of the prostate. Benign prostatic hyperplasia or BPH. This implies that screening with PSA alone may lead to false positive tests.
As a result, many men can have to undergo invasive follow-up procedures or treatments, including radiotherapy or chemotherapy, which carry serious risks, resembling incontinence and sexual unwanted side effects, even when their cancer was at low risk. Conversely, the PSA test can even miss some cancers (called “false negatives”) that go undetected and never treated appropriately.
Compounding the issue is the shortage of convincing evidence that mass screening reduces prostate cancer deaths. The UKNSC has up to now concluded that the balance of harms and advantages doesn’t support a nationwide screening programme.
That said, the committee recognizes that the talk is way from over. Proponents of screening point to latest data. A recent study in BMJ showed that PSA-based screening can reduce prostate cancer mortality by about 13% over time.
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Meanwhile, advances in technology have improved diagnostic pathways. Many men with high PSA levels are actually offered one MRI Scan before biopsy, reduce unnecessary biopsy and Risks associated with them.
Assuming the federal government follows the committee’s advice, what this implies in practice is that almost all men within the UK won’t be invited for normal prostate cancer checks. The only widespread option is the “informed choice” route, where men aged 50 and over who desire a PSA test can ask their GP, besides, they need to learn of the potential risks in addition to the advantages of the test.
However, this may increasingly not be the tip of the story. The committee has began consultation on its draft advice and the Shaar Study. This is as a result of its final advice in March 2026. He has also ordered Shar to do more modeling.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who will make the ultimate decision on screening, said: “I will fully examine the evidence and arguments in this draft recommendation, bringing together those with different views, before making a final recommendation in March.”
Per week before announcing the advice, a serious A two-year trial The launch was launched to judge and compare different screening methods, including rapid MRI scans, genetic testing and PSA blood testing.
But until screening can reliably distinguish malignant from benign cancers, the chance of overdiagnosis and overdiagnosis will remain an actual and serious concern.