Despite the long standing medical practice of regular prostrate screening, existing evidence from randomized controlled trials does not support such screening, concludes a study published on bmj.com.

However, a single test at age 60 could identify men who are most likely to develop and die from prostate cancer, concluded a second study.

Men as high risk could then be watched more closely.

While prostate cancer a common cancer among men. Screening remains controversial because experts can’t agree whether the benefits of screening outweigh the potential harms and costs of over-diagnosis and over-treatment of healthy men.

For the study, researchers at the University of Florida reviewed six studies, involving 387,286 participants. They found that screening aids in the diagnosis of prostate cancer at an earlier stage, but does not have a significant impact on mortality, and comes at the risk of over-treatment.

In the second study, researchers found that a single prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level test at age 60 strongly predicts a man’s lifetime risk of diagnosis and death from prostate cancer. They found that 90% of prostate cancer deaths occurred in men with highest PSA levels at age 60, whereas men with average or low PSA levels had negligible rates of prostate cancer or death by age 85.

Source
Eureka Alert