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by arcticbull 1 hour ago
At least the top 4, unclear about the 5th, are strongly associated with obesity. That would make someone high-risk and testing potentially warranted in like 70% of the population. Asymptomatic and low-risk is what I said. The incidence of hypertension is so high in the general population it’s almost always statistically supported (even though basically every doctors office takes it wrong, even cardiologists, amazingly).

On the other end of the spectrum, what doesn’t make sense is testing a random person off the street for Ebola. The prevalence approaches zero and symptoms are fairly noticeable, so any positive test is definitely wrong.

Most diseases are in between and have to be evaluated case by case, not buckshot.

You may be particularly interested to hear that there’s little evidence to support regular checkups in most adults beyond blood pressure testing and cervical cytology.

> Given the lack of favorable evidence and the potential adverse effect, primary care providers should consider the fact that general health checks, beyond the screening interventions shown to have benefit, likely have little or no effect on important health outcomes. Some of the interventions with demonstrated benefit have sufficiently large effects that a uniform application is warranted (blood pressure measurement and cervical cytology screening). In others, the trade‑off between benefits and harms is so close that patients should be involved in fully shared decision making regarding their participation (breast and colon cancer screening).

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31642821/

I suspect your doctor would agree with me. See if they’ll test you for Ebola, for instance. Not because you have symptoms but just cuz.