Clips: Shift in mammogram guidelines, U.S. obesity rates projected to soar

Panel: Routine mammograms should start at 50, not 40

An independent expert panel appointed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has reversed an earlier panel’s recommendations and now says women should not begin having routine mammograms until age 50.

Seven years ago, the same panel with different members had recommended that routine screening begin at age 40.

The recommendations drawn up by the panel, the United States Preventive Services Task Force, were published online yesterday in the Annals of Internal Medicine, a medical journal.

In the New York Times Gina Kolata writes:

The new recommendations, which do not apply to a small group of women with unusual risk factors for breast cancer, reverse longstanding guidelines and are aimed at reducing harm from overtreatment, the group says. It also says women age 50 to 74 should have mammograms less frequently — every two years, rather than every year. And it said doctors should stop teaching women to examine their breasts on a regular basis.

The National Cancer Institute said it would re-evaluate its recommendations in light of the task force’s new guidelines, Kolata reports, but the American Cancer Society and the American College of Radiology both intend to stay their guidelines advising annual mammograms starting at age 40.

In the same issue of the Times, Roni Caryn Rabin reports on some breast cancer advocacy groups that are opposed to the new recommendations.

To learn more:

• Read Kolata’s article In Reversal, Panel Urges Mammograms at 50, Not 40.
• Read Rabin’s article New Guidelines on Breast Cancer Draw Opposition.
• Read the full text of the panel’s recommendations in the Annals of Internal Medicine or at the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force’s Web page.

If trends hold, 43 percent of American adults will be obese in 2018

By 2018 43 percent, 103 million Americans, will be obese if current trends continue, according to a new report, and the medical conditions associated with obesity, such as diabetes and hypertension, will cost $344 billion a year, accounting for more than one in five dollars spent on health care.

If, on the other hand, the obesity rate of the U.S. could be held at today’s level, it would save the country an estimated $200 billion a year, the report finds.

The report concludes that unless something is done to reduce rates of preventable diseases, soaring costs of care will crush the U.S. health care system.

The report was prepared by the United Health Foundation, United Health Foundation, the American Public Health Association and the Partnership for Prevention.

To learn more:

• You can read the report and use interactive online to view details about your state at the America’s Health Rankings report Web site.

Inexpensive vitamin bests high-priced cholesterol drug in clinical trial

A new study has found that two widely prescribed and expensive cholesterol lowering drugs were no better than niacin in helping to clear coronary arteries in people already on standard cholesterol medications, reports Lyndsey Layton in The Washington Post.

The research, which appears Monday in the New England Journal of Medicine, is sending rumbles through the medical community because it is the third recent study to raise questions about the effectiveness of Zetia and its sister drug, Vytorin, highly profitable pharmaceuticals made by Merck & Co.

To learn more:

• Read Layton’s article: New study questions effectiveness of popular cholesterol drugs

Tags: Cholesterol, Mammography, Obesity, Prevention

Category: News