Study Says CT Screening and Surgery Can Prevent Large Number of Lung Cancer Deaths
CT scans can detect lung cancer at its most curable stage in high risk patients, according to a study in The New England Journal of Medicine, thereby dramatically improving the chances of survival.1 "In a population at risk for lung cancer, such screening could prevent some 80 percent of deaths from lung cancer," said the study. Currently, 164,000 people die from lung cancer annually. The purpose of the study was to determine whether early detection and treatment was sufficiently effective to justify screening all patients who are at high risk for the disease.
Among the major findings of the study:
- Survival chances increase with CT screening. The estimated 10-year survival rate of patients who were diagnosed by CT with stage I lung cancer was 88 percent. This is in contrast to the current 70 percent five-year survival of patients with this stage of lung cancer. The study also found a 92 percent survival rate for patients with stage I lung cancer who underwent surgery within a month after diagnosis. Again, this is in contrast to the usual 8-year survival rate of 75 percent for patients with similar stage cancer and treatment.
- CT screening for lung cancer is "highly cost-effective," according to the study. Among the reasons is that the cost of a CT scan is less than $200 and surgery for early stage lung cancer is less than half the cost of late stage treatment.
- CT screening for lung cancer is roughly comparable to mammography screening for breast cancer. The rates of detection of lung cancer among patients 40 years of age and older were slightly higher than those for the detection of breast cancer by mammography among women of the same age. Cost effectiveness is also similar to that of mammography screening.
Some observers have criticized the study because it did not include a "control arm" to compare the results of CT screening to outcomes in a group of patients who did not receive CT screening. The authors say that lung cancer is so pervasive that overall society serves effectively as a "control group." Separately, the National Institutes of Health is continuing a study of CT screening for lung cancer that expected to be released in 2009.
- "Survival of Patients with Stage I Lung Cancer Detected on CT Screening," The International Early Lung Cancer Action Program Investigators, Henschke CI, The New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 355, No. 17, October 26, 2006, pp. 1763-1771.
|
