Letters

Follow up in breast cancer

EDITOR,--John Dewar calls for a reappraisal of how women with breast cancer are followed up.¹ We now have compelling evidence that intensive follow up does not improve either quality of life related to health or overall survival.^{2 3} In the light of this, Dewar wonders what the effect of routine follow up is on the patient, in terms of both quality of life and cost. He also wonders what the optimum follow up practice should be and calls for as rigorous an assessment of follow up practices as has been applied to screening practices. An important step in that direction was the consensus conference on follow up in breast cancer, which he cites.

Among the papers presented at that conference was one giving the interim results of a randomised controlled trial we recently conducted.⁴ This trial evaluated a system of routine follow . . . [Full text of this article]

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Relevant Article

Follow up in breast cancer

John Dewar
BMJ 1995 310: 685-686. [Extract] [Full Text]

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