Does the PSA test for prostate cancer save lives? New data reverse gold-standard findings

Prostate cancer (cells, artificially coloured) affected 1.5 million people worldwide in 2022. Credit: Dr Gopal Murti/Science Photo Library Does prostate-cancer screening with the common ‘PSA’ blood test save lives? The Cochrane, an influential group renowned for its gold-standard medical reviews , has previously addressed that question twice, and twice the answer was ‘no.’ Now, data from nearly 800,000 people has prompted a U-turn. A Cochrane review published today 1 suggests that testing for prostate-specific antigen (PSA) “likely reduces the risk of dying” from prostate cancer – and without increasing the likelihood of negative side effects caused by prostate biopsies or prostate cancer treatment . Early-onset cancer fuels calls for wider screening — but at what cost? The number of lives saved is small, the group found, but the latest finding still marks a reversal of Cochrane reviews published in 2006 2 and 2013 3 . The authors of the most recent version say that that their findings were driven in part by data from two new trials 4 , 5 encompassing more than 250,000 people and from extra years of data from four older trials. The report comes as several policy bodies around the world are reviewing guidelines for medics on the use of PSA testing. “This finding is a milestone. I think it will make a difference for a lot of policy makers,” says Philipp Dahm, a urologist at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and corresponding author of the review. …