SO MUCH DONE, SO MUCH TO DO:

The number of older Americans treated for prostate cancer plummeted 42 percent since health officials began questioning the benefits of screening tests, a new study shows.

The finding points to the success of efforts to curtail the use of controversial prostate-specific antigen, or PSA, screening tests, said lead author Dr. Tudor Borza.

At the same time, his team found, doctors still face challenges trying to convince men diagnosed with early-stage prostate cancer to watch and wait before undergoing surgery or other invasive treatment, Borza said. [...]

"Diagnosis has a way of begetting treatment, whether or not it warrants treatment," said Dr. Gilbert Welch, professor of medicine at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice in Lebanon, New Hampshire. He was not involved with the new study.

"Patients think once cancer is there, you've got to act," Welch said in a phone interview. "The question is whether you want to be looking for early forms of cancer."

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