These cardiologists want routine cardiac CT screening as well as carotid ultrasounds. The USPSTF doesn’t recommend this. So they took Pfizer’s money and paid the American Journal of Cardiology to publish their “recommendations”:
The recommendation carried the seal of approval of an established medical journal: virtually every middle-aged man and woman should be screened routinely for heart disease, using sophisticated and pricey technology to take snapshots of clogged vessels.Usually, such a seismic shift in medical practice — it would affect 50 million US adults and easily cost $25 billion or more — emerges from a government agency or a major professional organization. But the guidelines that appeared earlier this month under the banner of The American Journal of Cardiology reflected the passions of a few dozen researchers.
The story of how the guidelines wound up in that journal illustrates how money and medicine intersect and opens a window into the arcane world of the medical publications that land on doctors’ desks and influence the treatment patients receive.
The guidelines appeared in a supplement to the 30,000-circulation journal instead of in its regular pages, meaning that the recommendations, which even the authors concede are not supported by rock-solid evidence, were not subjected to the standard review process.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Do no harm… to the providers’ pocketbook and social status.
I must disagree, based on statistics from the American Cancer Society regarding the number of deaths from breast and colon cancer (mere fractions) of the number of deaths each year from CVD, CVD screening is long overdue. A non-invasive means with a cost at a fraction of a cardiac cath just makes sense. Americans are slow to make the changes in their lives to prevent these deadly conditions therefore, in the meantime a fast, safe, noninvasive and definitive approach to screening could certainly help. I await more information with bated breath! Signed anonymously from a healthcare provider who cared for cardiac patients for over 12 years!