More people with a long history of smoking should be tested each year for lung cancer, even if they have stopped smoking in recent years, according to a new guideline released Tuesday by a group of health experts backed by government.
The U.S. Preventive Services Working Group routinely reviews and guides preventive care services in the country. Although it is officially a government agency, its guidelines are developed by relevant external experts contributed voluntarily. On Tuesday, the agency’s experts issued new guidelines for lung cancer screening, which they were too published in the medical journal JAMA.
The recommendations call for people between the ages of 50 and 80 who are at least 20 years of age to be screened annually for lung cancer. A pack year is defined as having smoked the equivalent of a pack – which has 20 cigarettes – a day for a year. People who have smoked so much, but have since stopped smoking, are still advised to take tests, as long as they have stopped smoking for the past 15 years. Screening is not recommended for those who quit smoking more than 15 years ago or who have conditions that would affect their life expectancy or willingness to undergo lung surgery.
The USPTF recommendations are not just polite advice; they greatly influence insurance coverage, which means that now more Americans should be eligible for lung cancer screening through their current health plans.
The new guidelines are broader than the most recent series, which was released in 2013. The previous version provided for the screening of people aged 55 to 80 with 30 years of smoking. According to the authors of the USPTF, since then there is new evidence that has demonstrated the potential benefits of earlier screening for people with a history of lighter smokers. A modeling study also published in JAMA on Tuesday, for example, Found that this new criterion would prevent more deaths from lung cancer in the long run compared to the previous guideline, with little added damage.
G / O Media may receive a commission
The study modeled what would happen if all those who were eligible and born in 1960 were diagnosed with lung cancer using low-dose computed tomography, the standard screening test. The new guidelines were expected to prevent 503 deaths per 100,000 people examined, compared to the 381 preventable deaths per 100,000 according to the old criteria.
It is important to note that the new guidelines may also help shorten certain gaps in cancer care. Although smoking remains the leading risk factor for lung cancer, the incidence of lung cancer is higher among black Americans than other racial groups, and it is thought that blacks and Native Americans are at higher risk for lung cancer at lower levels of smoking. Women can also be examined more now, as they generally smoke less on average than men.
“According to our analysis, the new recommendations will reduce disparities in lung cancer eligibility by gender and race, which we hope will reduce lung cancer disparities in the U.S.,” said Rafael Meza, associate professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan School of Public Health that led the new model research published in JAMA, said in a statement released by the university.
Currently, lung cancer is the second most common cancer in the US, with over 200,000 confirmed cases a year. And while the number of deaths from lung cancer has steadily declined over the decades, it remains the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States This year, approximately 131,880 Americans are expected to die.