A decade-long study by the National Cancer Institute on the affects of prostate cancer screenings recently determined that the number of deaths from the illness essentially stayed the same, even for those who don't receive the screenings.
The study looked at 76,693 men, half of which were told to receive yearly screenings over a period of 10 years. The other half were told to simply receive regular medical treatments with no "recommendations for or against annual prostate exams." Dr. Christine Berg, chief of the NCI's early detection research group and one of the study's authors, says that more research still needs to be done.
"We need longer follow-up to determine whether the impact of the diagnoses of prostate cancer will translate into fewer deaths for prostate cancer," she said.
Still, doctors found that after following the study's participants for between seven and 10 years, the rate of death from prostate cancer remained low and was not very different from one group to another.
For more on this story:
- check out the CNN.com article