Rebuttal of Ongoing Anti-Early Detection Crusade

Dr. Tabár and his research group have put together a PowerPoint presentation that deals with a very timely subject. 

No matter how much reliable data the researchers publish in peer reviewed journals (who have access to individual patient material and have the knowledge to evaluate the impact of early detection on long-term patient outcome), a handful of foes of mammography screening with predetermined agendas keep repeating their unfounded statements that may harm women. They neither have access to individual patient data, nor have the experience and knowledge to evaluate data properly. They advise against screening, but do not know which woman’s breast cancer was detected at screening, or whose cancer was detected outside screening. 

We are providing the full lecture, with embedded video and audio.  It is presented in three parts. 

PART ONE            PART TWO            PART THREE

We call your attention specifically to the inserted sound / video media on slides 89, 111, 116, 123, 135-137. You will be able to form your own opinion about the ongoing unfortunate “debate” which is difficult to explain fully. 

They try to convince women that the major impact on long-term outcome of a breast cancer patient originates from improvement in treatment. But, without individual data, it is impossible to completely separate the effects of improved treatment from that of screening. These foes of early detection want to throw women back to the middle ages when huge, ulcerated breast cancers were detected all too late, at a stage when no medical intervention could cure the disease. They mislead women with false data, “estimation”, and with studies “out of space”, as Dr. Welch calls it.