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Prostate screening antigen tests are often used as a common cancer screening tests for men. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine concluded that the test cannot be proven to reduce the risk of death to prostrate cancer in men.

Prostate cancer is the second most common form of cancer in men, and the most common form of cancer among men who do not smoke. The inventor of the test recently called its extensive use an expensive public health disaster.

The test itself simply measures the level of prostate cancer antigens found in the blood. While it can detect a tumor, it cannot distinguish between an aggressive tumor that requires treatment and a tumor growing slowly in the patient’s body. These smaller non-aggressive tumors are not likely to result in a patient’s death. The level of prostate antigens in a man’s blood can spike for reasons not related to cancer.

The creator of the test has called it a public health disaster and the American Cancer Society does not recommend it as part of a screening process to detect early cancer tumors in the prostate. Medicare and the Veterans Administration pay much of the $3 billion per year cots for the number of PSA tests that take place in the United States each year.