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Highlights - Report Card 2006
Prevention and Screening
The World Health Organization estimates that a vigorous program of prevention has the potential to reduce the overall cancer burden by up to 50 per cent. A cancer
control strategy must include prevention as a major component. 1) Primary Prevention (preventing cancer in healthy people)- Should be linked to other ongoing activities such as:
- prevention of other non communicable diseases (diabetes, heart and lung)
- programs already in place to control cancer risk factors (i.e. tobacco-free initiative)
- programs being developed (i.e National Nutrition Strategy)
- Public and political support is critical
2) Secondary Prevention (screening)-
Stalls in Canada because recruitment strategies aren't effective; no province has accepted the responsibility for introducing all components deemed necessary to make a program successful.
3) Tertiary Prevention (measures taken to prevent recurrence)
- While well known, these strategies (i.e. exercise, reduced saturated fat, etc.) have been neglected by the formal cancer system
- Overloaded cancer centres regularly discharge survivors from surveillance without appropriate instructions or resources to prevent recurrence.
- More emphasis should be placed on cancer prevention trials in cancer survivors
Recommendations- Provinces with existing programs should collaborate and learn from one another
- More research is necessary to understand risk/benefit of several agents found to reduce the incidence of cancer in individuals at high risk (i.e. tamoxifen, raloxifene for breast cancer)
- Translational research should be a priority, to predict which individuals would benefit from primary prevention strategies
- Tertiary prevention needs the attention of cancer agencies
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