Oral cancer screening for asymptomatic adults: do the United States Preventive Services Task Force draft guidelines miss the proverbial forest for the trees?

A selection of abstracts of clinically relevant papers from other journals. The abstracts on this page have been chosen and edited by John R. Radford.

Abstract

Cancers 'detected at an earlier stage through screening examinations may inherently have less aggressive biologic potential' and this may be the reason for improved survival.

Main

Edwards PC. Oral Surg Oral Med Oral Pathol Oral Radiol 2013; 116: 131–134

The US Preventive Services Task Force recently released a draft Recommendation Statement that states 'current evidence is insufficient to assess the balance of benefits and harms of screening for oral cancer in asymptomatic adults.' Is this advice disingenuous? For example, patients with tumours localised to the primary site have an 83% 5-year survival rate, whereas those with distant metastases only have a 36% 5-year survival rate. Yet the author of this editorial suggests this improved survival may be as a consequence that those tumours detected early 'may inherently have less aggressive biologic potential'. When considering harm from unnecessary biopsies, the ADA's Council on Scientific Affairs, offers the following sensible advice: untoward consequences could be minimised by referral to a specialist.