{"id":9439,"date":"2016-06-07T00:00:40","date_gmt":"2016-06-07T05:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.senioradvisor.com\/blog\/?p=9439"},"modified":"2016-09-07T08:34:43","modified_gmt":"2016-09-07T13:34:43","slug":"lung-cancer-screenings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/d30braiqprupoq.cloudfront.net\/blog\/2016\/06\/lung-cancer-screenings\/","title":{"rendered":"Lung Cancer Screenings"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1>Lung Cancer Screenings<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-9570\" src=\"https:\/\/s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/img.prod.aplaceformom.com\/main\/uploads\/sa-blog\/2016\/06\/LungCancerScreenings-350x293.jpg\" alt=\"Lung Cancer Screenings\" width=\"350\" height=\"293\" srcset=\"https:\/\/s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/img.prod.aplaceformom.com\/main\/uploads\/sa-blog\/2016\/06\/LungCancerScreenings-350x293.jpg 350w, https:\/\/s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/img.prod.aplaceformom.com\/main\/uploads\/sa-blog\/2016\/06\/LungCancerScreenings-768x644.jpg 768w, https:\/\/s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/img.prod.aplaceformom.com\/main\/uploads\/sa-blog\/2016\/06\/LungCancerScreenings.jpg 940w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><\/h1>\n<p>Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for men and women in the US. That&#8217;s partly because patients usually don\u2019t have symptoms early, when the disease is most treatable. Doctors recommend lung cancer screenings for people with certain risk factors to catch the disease early enough to treat it.\u00a0Here\u2019s a look at who should be screened\u00a0and how\u00a0early detection can help.<\/p>\n<h2>How much of a difference can early detection make?<\/h2>\n<p>The 5-year <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.lung.org\/lung-health-and-diseases\/lung-disease-lookup\/lung-cancer\/learn-about-lung-cancer\/lung-cancer-fact-sheet.html\" target=\"_blank\">survival rate <\/a>i<\/strong>s 54% for people whose cancer is found before it spreads beyond the lungs. Right now only 15 out of every 100 lung cancers are caught that early. The overwhelming majority of lung cancer patients are diagnosed only after the disease has spread to other organs. By then, the 5-year survival rate is a mere 4%. By screening high risk patients each year, doctors hope to catch more small cancers and offer their patients better 5-year survival rates.<\/p>\n<h2>Who should be screened for lung cancer?<\/h2>\n<p>The US Preventive Services Task Force, an independent group of medical and preventive health experts, published its latest <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org\/Page\/Document\/UpdateSummaryFinal\/lung-cancer-screening\" target=\"_blank\">lung cancer screening recommendations<\/a> <\/strong>in 2013. They call for yearly screenings of adults between age 55 and 80 who:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Currently smoke or quit less than 15 years ago<\/li>\n<li>Have smoked for at least 30 \u201cpack years\u201d (One <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cancer.gov\/publications\/dictionaries\/cancer-terms?cdrid=306510\" target=\"_blank\">pack year<\/a><\/strong> = smoking 20 cigarettes each day for a year)<\/li>\n<li>Are willing and able to go through lung surgery if the screening finds a mass<\/li>\n<li>Don\u2019t have a sharply reduced life expectancy because of another health problem<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Medicare and many private insurance plans cover the entire cost of lung cancer screening for patients who meet the USPSTF criteria above. If you\u2019re unsure about your coverage, you can check\u00a0this American Lung Association <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.lung.org\/assets\/documents\/lung-cancer\/interactive-library\/lung-cancer-insurance-chart.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">chart<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Your doctor may also advise screening due to other risk factors like a history of exposure to asbestos, radon, lots of secondhand smoke, industrial chemicals and mining pollutants. If a\u00a0parent or sibling had lung cancer or if you\u2019ve had radiation treatment for other types of cancer, your doctor may want to screen you.<\/p>\n<h2>What types of lung cancer screenings are available?<\/h2>\n<p>There are lots of ways to look for early-stage lung cancer, including chest x-rays and lung mucus testing. The American Lung Association says the most effective lung cancer screening tool\u00a0is <strong>the low-dose spiral CT scan<\/strong>. The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.lung.org\/lung-health-and-diseases\/lung-disease-lookup\/lung-cancer\/diagnosing-and-treating\/lung-cancer-screening.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>LDCT <\/strong><\/a>gathers multiple images of the patient and the combined images can show even small, slow-growing tumors. Medicare covers this type of scan for high-risk beneficiaries from age 55 to 77.<\/p>\n<h2>What happens after the screening test?<\/h2>\n<p>Your doctor will tell you the <strong>results<\/strong> of your scan after they\u2019ve been read by a radiologist. If the scan is clear, you don\u2019t have to do anything for another year (although if you still smoke you should work on\u00a0quitting). If the scan shows something suspicious, your doctor will probably order\u00a0more tests. Remember that not every growth that shows up on a scan is cancer. If further tests confirm\u00a0cancer, your doctor will go over treatment options with you, and you\u2019ll have more options and better potential outcomes because of early detection.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lung Cancer Screenings Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for men and women in the US. That&#8217;s partly because patients usually don\u2019t have symptoms early, when the disease is most treatable. Doctors recommend lung cancer screenings for people with certain risk factors to catch the disease early enough to treat it.\u00a0Here\u2019s a look at who should be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2198,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[200,35],"tags":[203,45],"class_list":{"0":"post-9439","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-families-caregivers","7":"category-senior-health-fitness","8":"tag-medicare","9":"tag-senior-health"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Lung Cancer Screenings - SeniorAdvisor.com Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Lung Cancer Screenings Here\u2019s a look at who should be screened, why early detection matters, and what to expect from your screening.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Lung Cancer Screenings - 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