Are you at risk?
If you have smoked heavily or have smoked for many years,
the answer is yes. Smoking put you at risk even if you no
longer smoke or do not have any symptoms.
What's the connection between
smoking and cancer?
There is no doubt about it--cigarette smoking can cause
lung cancer. In fact, cigarette smoking is the leading cause
of lung cancer. Every year, more than 169,000 people in the
United States get lung cancer, and nearly 155,000 people die
from the disease.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for both
men and women.
Your risk of lung cancer depends on how many cigarettes
and how long you've smoked. Quitting reduces the risk, but
half of all lung cancers occur in former smokers.
What's the purpose of the
study?
The National Lung Screening Trial is a lung cancer
screening trial. Screening means testing people to detect a
disease before it causes symptoms.
The purpose of this study is to compare two ways of
detecting lung cancer:
- Standard chest x-ray
- Spiral computed tomography (CT) scan.
Both chest x-rays and spiral CT scans are used in an
effort to find lung cancer early. So far, neither chest
x-ray nor spiral CT scans have been shown to reduce a
person's chance of dying from lung cancer.
This study aims to show which test is better at reducing
deaths from this disease.
Lung cancer research is a high priority for the National
Cancer Institute and it is supporting this study at more
than 30 locations throughout the United States. This study
is a vital part of the effort to reduce the toll of lung
cancer.
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