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PROSTATE CANCER

The USPSTF screening recommendation: a swinging pendulum

A recent study reports widespread decreases in PSA screening, prostate cancer diagnoses, and use of active treatment modalities since the 2011–2012 United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommendation against PSA screening. The updated 2017 USPSTF guideline, which embraces individualized decision-making, suggests the pendulum swung too far, but must not prompt a return to indiscriminate screening.

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Fig. 1: Age-adjusted prostate cancer incidence rate in men between 1975 and 2013.

Figure reproduced from the SEER Database, National Cancer Institute.

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Acknowledgements

The authors sincerely thank M. Roobol for her help, feedback, and advice on the manuscript. S.V.C’s work on this article was supported in part by funds from the Sidney Kimmel Center for Prostate and Urologic Cancers, a Specialized Program of Research Excellence grant (P50-CA92629) from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to H. Scher, a National Institutes of Health (NIH)–NCI Cancer Center Support Grant (P30-CA008748) to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, a grant from the NCI as part of the Cancer Intervention and Surveillance Modelling Network (U01CA199338-02), and the David H. Koch Prostate Cancer Research Fund.

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Correspondence to Sigrid V. Carlsson.

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S.V.C. has received a lecture honorarium and travel support from Astellas Pharma (unrelated to the current article). K.F. declares no competing interests.

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Fleshner, K., Carlsson, S.V. The USPSTF screening recommendation: a swinging pendulum. Nat Rev Urol 15, 532–534 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41585-018-0062-5

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