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Vol.45 No.2 contents | Japanese/English |
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Quality Control in Lung Cancer Screening in Japan
Tomio Nakayama1, Yoko Kusunoki1, Takaichiro Suzuki11Division of Epidemiology, Department of Cancer Control and Statistics, Osaka Medical Center for Cancer and Cardiovascular Diseases, Japan
The number of people screened for lung cancer has been increasing and now exceeds 7000000 per year in Japan, but the number of detected lung cancer is only about 3600 cases (detection rate; 0.051%) and has not been increasing. When detection rates were compared according to prefectures, in the detection rate varied by a factor of as much of 6.2 as large. In some municipalities, the rate of compliance and completion of diagnostic work-up fell below 30%. None of the lung cancer cases had been detected in the past two years in 6.3% of municipalities with 5000 or more screened people. Lung cancer screening has spread rapidly, though there is no framework for external quality control in Japan. Therefore, only the number of screening participants and the cost of screening are managed, the level of accuracy of the screening is not controlled in each municipalities offering the screening program. Thus screening participants are not offered a uniformly accurate of screening program. It is necessary to innovate guidelines including a quality control index, and to disclose information of the screening result by a central coordinative organization.
key words: Quality control, Lung cancer, Screening
JJLC 45 (2): 183-187, 2005
