What Is Cancer Screening?

Some types of cancer can be found before they cause symptoms. Checking for cancer (or for conditions that may lead to cancer) in people who have no symptoms is called screening. Screening can help doctors find and treat some types of cancer early. Generally, cancer treatment is more effective when the disease is found early. However, not all types of cancer have screening tests and some tests are only for people with specific genetic risks.

Overview of Cancer Screening and Testing

• Cancer Screening Overview (PDQ®) ¹
  Information about measuring the effectiveness of cancer screening tests and weighing the evidence from screening research studies.
  
  
• What You Need To Know About™ Cancer: Screening ²
  Describes possible risks, screening, symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment for cancer.

Types of Screening Tests

• Information about cancer screening and the types of tests ³ used to find cancer.

Screening for Specific Types of Cancer

For some types of cancer, research shows that using certain screening tests regularly will reduce deaths from that cancer.

• Breast Cancer ⁴
• Cervical Cancer ⁵
• Colon and Rectal Cancer ⁶

For other types of cancer, screening methods are in use or being studied, but their ability to reduce the number of deaths from cancer has not been established.

• Lung Cancer ⁷
• Prostate Cancer ⁸
• Other Types of Cancer ⁹