Just a little public service announcement regarding what they don’t usually tell you.
Beware the cancer risk of CT scans. Also read up on the raging debate sparked by a federally funded US task force of physicians who found that the benefits of regular mammography for women between 40 and 50 are outweighed by the risks.
I have always wondered why cancer is on the rise. Might not some of the cancer cases be due to tests/scans like these?
This from the Wall Street Journal:
The risk of cancer associated with popular CT scans appears to be greater than previously believed, according to two new studies published Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
The findings support caution against the overuse of CT scans and other medical technologies that use radiation. The studies also bolstered the rationale behind controversial new breast-cancer screening guidelines, which pushed back the recommended age for annual mammograms to 50 from 40. Mammograms also use radiation, but in smaller doses. Full article here.
Related posts:
“why cancer is on the rise?”
Is it? Maybe other causes of death are being treated with greater success than cancer? We have to die of something – if we have access to healthcare, it’ll be the one they’re less able to treat. Is it rising as the one that finally takes us, or is it actually becoming more common? I hadn’t heard ‘on the rise’ before.
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The credit for life expectancy increase had often been claimed by modern medicine. But this is not true. The actual life expectancy had not changed much over the centuries. How do we then account for the apparent increase in life expectancy ? That’s the beauty and deceptiveness of taking the mean. The following article is quite revealing.
http://www.healthpromoting.com/Articles/articles/expect.htm
What is important to note is that modern man with modern medicine suffers greatly from chronic ailments.
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Life is about weighing risks.
For example, it is far riskier to do an angiogram than a CT scan to determine if we have a blocked artery to the heart should other indications show that we may have a heart problem even though a chest CT scan exposes the patient to more than 100 times the radiation dose of a typical chest X-ray.
If one or more of my parents or siblings have cancer, then the chance of me contracting one is much higher than an average Joe or Jane. Thus it make sense to nib the problem at the bud because the chance of surviving a cancer improves with early detection.
Basically, each of us have to weigh our individual situation and take our own risks according to available information. No doctor will force you to take an X-ray related scan if you refuse and we should always be wise to seek a second opinion.
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Yes, I take your point about weighing risks.
The thing is many people are not even aware of the risks, which are often not clearly spelt out for them.
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Cancer survival rate is better if detected early is a myth and a lie propagated by big pharma who are only interested in more people going for dangerous screening. What are the facts ?
It is true that mammograms do detect cancer at an earlier stage and when the cancer growth is smaller. The 5 year survival rate used by big pharma to convince us that things have improved with their dangerous drugs is actually misleading. Let us take 2 groups of people to illustrate my point. Half the group goes for regular mammogram and let’s assume that 30% of the cancer were detected 2 year earlier on. At the 6th annivasary (after 5 years of detecting cancer) let’s assume that 50% of them had survived.
The other group that do not go for mammogram had 30% of them getting cancer detected by the usual approach 2 year after the first group. 5 year later this second group had only 30% survival rate. Does this mean that this second group has lower survival rate ? Notice that at the end of 5th year of this second group it would be the 7th year of the first group. It had been found that the surival rate of the first group is actually similar to the second group. What had changed was that the first group had to live with cancer 2 year longer.
Allopathic medicine treatment modality of cancer is a failed paradigm and what is even more damning ; for every breast cancer detected earlier it caused 2 breast cancers to be developed. This was discovered in a canadian study and was later repeated in europe. These studies were very large and has great accuracy.
Not only many patients are not aware of the risks many doctors themselves either refused to accept the finding or were ignorant of it and had continued to spout big pharma line. It is a highly profitable industry.
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Anil, you are right about patients not being aware or informed of the risks. At least the radiologist handling the procedure should inform the patients. But when I did two CT scans, neither the radiologist nor the doctor who recommended the scans done advised me of the risks – they were more concerned that I agree to the scan. Not all CT scans are conclusive, nor is it able to diagnose the problem. Sometimes I do question the need to have one.
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The following excerpt is revealing.
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Dr. John Gofman is a nuclear physicist – he holds a Ph.D in nuclear and physical chemistry – as well as a medical doctor. He is also one of the leading experts in the world in these issues and his conclusion is that a high percentage of cancers today are x-ray induced.
The evidence presented in his book, “Radiation from Medical Procedures in the Pathogenesis of Cancer and Ischemic Heart Disease”, strongly indicates that over 50% of the death-rate from cancer today, and over 60% of the death-rate from ischemic heart disease today, are x-ray-induced.
While a graduate student at U.C. Berkeley, Gofman earned his Ph.D. in 1943 in nuclear/physical chemistry. His faculty advisor was Glenn T. Seaborg (who became Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, 1961-1971).
Dr. Gofman’s 5 books present a series of findings. His 1990 book includes his proof, “by any reasonable standard of biomedical proof”, that there is no threshold level (no harmless dose) of ionizing radiation with respect to radiation carcinogenesis and mutagenesis. His 1996 book provides evidence to support the claim that medical radiation is a necessary co-factor in about 3/4 of the recent and current breast cancer incidence in the U.S. – a conclusion doubted, but not at all refuted by several peer-reviewers.
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And more collection of scary facts :
http://www.newstarget.com/010886.html
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http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2010/01/asian-wildlife/christy-text/1
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It’s very true that radiologists “never” disclose the hazards of radiation – be it by means of CT scans or any other modes of radiation-based clincal procedures. It’s especially more so with Asian-based clinicians. Our current so called quality procedures and patient charters never stress on the health-risk posed by these radiation procedures. Sad – how ignorant are our so well versed MOH officials are.
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