The efficacy of sputum cytology in mass screening program for early detection of lung cancer.
BACKGROUND
In order to evaluate the efficacy of sputum cytology in lung cancer screening, we re-analyzed the data obtained in our previous case-control study.


METHODS
The source population was defined as the previous screenees for reducing self-selection bias. Matching conditions were: gender, year of birth, municipality and smoking history.


RESULTS
Smoking adjusted odds ratio (SAOR) of dying from lung cancer for those screened by chest roentgenogram (CXp) only vs. not screened was 0.47, and that for those screened by sputum cytology (SpC) & CXp vs. not screened was 0.36, which was approximately three-fourths of the former. In another analysis, SAOR for those screened by SpC & CXp vs. those screened by CXp only was 0.63.


CONCLUSIONS
Although statistical significance was not obtained, there might be some possibility that the risk of lung cancer death in smokers would decrease by additional SpC, compared with CXp only.
Sagawa
Motoyasu
M
Department of Thoracic Surgery, Kanazawa Medical University, 1-1 Daigaku, Uchinada, Ishikawa 920-0293, Japan. sagawam@kanazawa-med.ac.jp
Saito
Yasuki
Y
Sato
Masami
M
Takahashi
Satomi
S
Usuda
Katsuo
K
Kanma
Keiji
K
Endo
Chiaki
C
Sakurada
Akira
A
Sugita
Makoto
M
Sakuma
Tsutomu
T
D000368:Aged; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology*; D008297:Male; D008403:Mass Screening / Q000379:methods*; D008875:Middle Aged; D011859:Radiography; D012907:Smoking / Q000009:adverse effects; D013183:Sputum / Q000166:cytology*