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Internal Medicine Residents’ Perspective on Prostate Cancer Screening
Nathan S. Suskovic, MD, Grant L. Steele, MD, Adam S. Feldman, MD.
Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
BACKGROUND: Prostate cancer (PCa) screening has undergone notable changes over the past decade, including the changes in United States Preventative Services Task Force’s recommendations and multiple randomized controlled trials showing varying utility in PCa screening. These varying recommendations have changed practice habits of internal medicine (IM) doctors. The goal of this study is to determine the opinion, and therefore likely future practice habits of current IM residents on PCa screening.
METHODS: A 12 to14 question survey was created (Figures 1 and 2) and distributed to three IM residency programs. In total there are approximately 400 categorial IM residents across the three institutions.
RESULTS: There were a total of 106 responses to the survey (Figures 1 and 2). Eighty percent of residents learned about PCa screening during their training and 71 percent feel comfortable discussing PCa screening with their patients. Forty one percent of IM residents do not believe PSA should be used for PCa screening. Roughly half of IM residents believe that PCa is overtreated. One fourth of residents were able to correctly interpret a PSA in a man taking finasteride.
CONCLUSIONS: The majority of IM residents felt comfortable discussing PCa screening with patients; however, nearly half believe PSA should not be used for screening. There are also gaps in knowledge regarding abnormal PSA values and interpreting them in men on finasteride. These knowledge gaps represent educational needs which urology resident led lecture series could address to ensure IM resident physicians are educated on appropriate PCa screening and PSA interpretation.
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