Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by goosejuice 16 days ago
The risk is the primary reason the age for first colonoscopy is so high. Even with cologuard it's not typical before 40 unless you have family history.

There's also risks of false positives/negatives for some tests which complicate matters as well.
1 comments
bonsai_spool 16 days ago
> The risk is the primary reason the age for first colonoscopy is so high

What? I have a hard time understanding this, what is your primary reference.

Colonoscopies take a lot of resources and GI docs are in high demand—these seem much more plausible limiting factors than undefined 'risks' inherent to the procedure.

link
goosejuice 16 days ago
Those are also factors for sure, but the the risks from complications aren't undefined. Even cheap and non invasive screening carry risk due to false positives inviting unnecessary downstream procedures.

Not an MD but have worked in cancer prevention for a while in a software capacity.

See figure 5 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34003219/

link
bonsai_spool 16 days ago
> https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8409520/figure/F5/

You can link to the figures directly for PMC articles.

My point is that the risks aren't the limit for how we think about testing (though they exist), but instead the low marginal improvement in diagnostic yield and life expectancy.

link