Where's the syllabus? --&-- Serious Cancer Screening Info

I'm so excited to be fully registered & ready to move forward on my journey toward a Doctorate of Education in Holistic Health & Wellness---I have my books & am ready to start! I promised to share information with you as I'm learning--hopefully you'll find some of it relevant and helpful for yourself and your family.

So first of all, I started looking for the syllabus that lists what to read, the assignments...I still remember the basics...and I know I won't get very far without the syllabus! After searching the website, I finally called my advisor to find out how to access the syllabus (I actually needed 2...). She left a voicemail describing the syllabus, which is actually what I thought was one of my books. Obviously I hadn't actually opened the books yet (not that one, anyway)---I thought I needed the syllabus first! My recollection of a class syllabus was 1-3 pieces of paper, not a bound book--Yikes! Now that I've figured out that pretty basic piece of information, I'm really ready to get started--and yes, I admit, I am blonde! :o)

On a much more serious note, here are some excerpts from an article in today's New York Times on cancer screening. To me, the message is clear---we can't rely totally on screening to keep us healthy---various screenings play important roles in our health care. (Yes, I get regular mammograms & Pap smears--& soon I'll be old enough to start the screening colonoscopies--Yay!).


Here are excerpts from today's article:
"The American Cancer Society, which has long been a staunch defender of most cancer screening, is now saying that the benefits of detecting many cancers, especially breast and prostate, have been overstated.

It is quietly working on a message, to put on its Web site early next year, to emphasize that screening for breast and prostate cancer and certain other cancers can come with a real risk of overtreating many small cancers while missing cancers that are deadly.

“We don’t want people to panic,” said Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the cancer society. “But I’m admitting that American medicine has overpromised when it comes to screening. The advantages to screening have been exaggerated.”

Prostate cancer screening has long been problematic. The cancer society, which with more than two million volunteers is one of the nation’s largest voluntary health agencies, does not advocate testing for all men. And many researchers point out that the PSA prostate cancer screening test has not been shown to prevent prostate cancer deaths.

In it, researchers report a 40 % increase in breast cancer diagnoses and a near doubling of early stage cancers, but just a 10 % decline in cancers that have spread beyond the breast to the lymph nodes or elsewhere in the body. With prostate cancer, the situation is similar, the researchers report.

If breast and prostate cancer screening really fulfilled their promise, the researchers note, cancers that once were found late, when they were often incurable, would now be found early, when they could be cured. A large increase in early cancers would be balanced by a commensurate decline in late-stage cancers. That is what happened with screening for colon and cervical cancers. But not with breast and prostate cancer.

Still, the researchers and others say, they do not think all screening will — or should — go away. Instead, they say that when people make a decision about being screened, they should understand what is known about the risks and benefits."

It's me again...thanks for taking time to learn about your health and how to take ownership of your health...I look forward to sharing what I'm learning with you!

Blessings on your health--
Sana