Identifying unmet health needs in older people: comprehensive screening is not the answer

[摘要] The case for routine comprehensive screening for unmet health needs in the older population has collapsed. A very large randomised controlled trial in the UK has demonstrated that there are little or no benefits to quality of life or health outcomes from population screening,1 endorsing the deletion of the obligation to offer annual screening from the contract for general practice in Britain. The evidence of benefit from such whole population screening had always been thin, and the UK's ‘75 and over checks’ had stalled long before they disappeared quietly from the new GP contract, suggesting that a mechanistic approach to needs assessment without a robust evidence base makes both bad science and bad policy.2

[学科分类] 卫生学