ERSPC study shows PSA screening reduced prostate cancer deaths by 20%

The effectiveness of PSA (prostate-specific antigen) screening on reducing prostate cancer mortality has been given a boost with new data from the European Randomized Study of Screening for Prostate Cancer (ERSPC). This shows the true impact to be far higher than previously reported - up to 31%.

Their findings, published in January 2010’s European Urology suggest that a PSA cut off level of 3ng/ml combined with an individual risk assessment would reduce biopsies by 33%. The majority of cancers potentially missed would be indolent, so there would be no benefit from active treatment. Increasing the PSA cut-off level from 3 to 4 ng/ml may save a similar number of biopsies, but will miss more clinically significant cancers.