Millions Need to Be Screened for Cancer, According to Reports in CDC Vital Signs

Millions Need to Be Screened for Cancer, According to Reports in CDC Vital Signs™

Most adults are getting recommended breast and colon (colorectal) cancer screenings. Yet more than 22 million adults have not had screening tests for colon cancer, and more than 7 million women have not had a recent mammogram to screen for breast cancer as recommended, according to reports in a new monthly scientific publication called CDC Vital Signs.

Colon Cancer

• Screening tests can find colon cancer. Colon cancer screening tests can find precancerous polyps so they can be removed before they turn into cancer, thus preventing the disease. Screening tests can also find colon cancer early, when treatment works best.
  
• About a third of people are not getting screened as recommended. This could be because they don't know they can get colon cancer, they don't have insurance or a doctor, or their doctor hasn't recommended screening.

Breast Cancer

• Mammograms save lives. The best way to find breast cancer is by having a mammogram (an X-ray of the breasts). Mammograms can find breast cancer early, before it is big enough to feel or cause symptoms and when it is easier to treat.
  
• Some women are not getting mammograms as recommended. About one of five women between the ages of 50 and 74 has not had a mammogram in the past two years. This may be because their doctor didn't tell them to get one, they don't have insurance and can't afford one, or they don't think mammograms work.

What Can Be Done?

• Health departments can find out why some groups of people are not being screened, and create programs to solve these problems and increase screening.
  
• Doctors and other health care providers can tell patients who should be screened about test options, make sure patients who can't afford tests know about free screening services in their area, and remind patients when a screening test is due.
  
• People can ask their doctor about getting screened, get screened as recommended, and see their doctor promptly if a screening test shows there might be a problem.

For more information, please read the reports:

• Vital Signs: Colorectal Cancer Screening Among Adults Aged 50–75 Years—United States, 2008
• Vital Signs: Breast Cancer Screening Among Women Aged 50–74 Years—United States, 2008

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Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) · 1600 Clifton Rd · Atlanta GA 30333 · 800-CDC-INFO (800-232-4636)

        

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Flexibility key to health care planning for rural Australia

Accessibility and human rights, instead of rigid funding models, should be the priorities when planning health care services for rural and remote Australia says a leading Charles Sturt University (CSU) academic.

“A model of health-care funding for rural and remote Australia should be developed based on fundamental human rights and access to services rather than ‘bricks and mortar’,” said Professor Patrick Ball.

The Professor of Rural and Remote Pharmacy Patrick Ball studied two communities in Central West NSW between 2006 and 2008 as part of his examination of the provision of health services outside Australia.

“The two communities were similar and only a short distance apart but had very different health care needs due to transport links and proximity to a city,” said Professor Ball.

“We have the evidence to show that what is needed by rural and remote areas is more flexibility in allowing individual communities to meet their health needs and more emphasis on access to services rather than what hospital and which health facilities are located where.

“The expenditure of the health dollar has been centrally controlled and based on a mix of what a community has traditionally had and what the community has secured through pressure and lobbying.

“No community can have everything; therefore there is a need for flexibility in the future, including the sharing of health services between big and small communities and even trading of health services.

“The rigid model of health care funding does not serve rural and remote Australia well,” concluded Professor Ball.

Patrick Ball was appointed Australia’s first Professor of Rural and Remote Pharmacy when he joined CSU in 2005. His work centres on the provision of health services in rural and remote Australia. Professor Ball is based at the School of Biomedical Sciences at CSU at Wagga Wagga.         

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