General Health part of Myhealthblogging.com Channel

Screening, in medicine, is a strategy used to identify disease in an unsuspecting population. Unlike most medicine, in screening, tests are performed on those without any clinical indication of disease.

Screening means looking for early signs of a particular disease in ‘healthy’ people who do not have any symptoms. Screening cannot prevent cancer; only find it as early as possible.

Cancer is a group of diseases in which cells are aggressive (grow and divide without respect to normal limits). Nearly all cancers are caused by abnormalities in the genetic material of the transformed cells. These abnormalities may be due to the effects of carcinogens, such as tobacco smoke, radiation, chemicals, or infectious agents. Genetic abnormalities found in cancer typically affect two general classes of genes.

Then, what makes a good screening test? Well, there are some principles. The first is that you must have a test that is capable of finding the cancer early. This is why we can’t screen for all types of cancer. We just do not have reliable tests for most of them.

But it costs not a little money? Yes, of course. But, ideally, screening saves money. It should be cheaper to pick up and treat the disease early than to leave it and treat at a more advanced stage. Agree with me? :-)

Topik: Cancer, General, Medicines, Therapy