Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2022 Apr 14:16:100353.
doi: 10.1016/j.lanepe.2022.100353. eCollection 2022 May.

Targeted screening in the UK: A narrow concept with broad application

Anna Bobrowska  1 , Molly Murton  1 , Farah Seedat  2 , Cristina Visintin  2 , Anne Mackie  2 , Robert Steele  2   3 , John Marshall  2
Affiliations
Review

Targeted screening in the UK: A narrow concept with broad application

Anna Bobrowska et al. Lancet Reg Health Eur. .

Abstract

A recent report on screening in the UK proposed that the responsibility for recommendations on population and targeted screening programmes should be held by one new integrated advisory body. There is no wide international consensus on the definition of targeted screening. Our review identified and compared the defining components of screening terms: targeted, population, selective, and cascade screening, and case finding. Definitions of targeted screening and population screening were clearly demarcated by the eligible population; targeted and selective screening were found to be conceptually interchangeable; cascade screening, whilst conceptually similar to targeted screening across several components, was only used within the context of genetic diseases. There was little consensus between different definitions of case finding. These comparisons contributed to an updated definition of targeted screening. Considerable overlap between definition components across terms implies that a broad range of disease areas may fall into the remit of the new advisory body.

Keywords: Cascade screening; Case finding; Population screening; Screening; Selective screening; Targeted screening.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

All authors have completed the ICMJE uniform disclosure form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf and declare: AB and MM have received grants from the UK NSC for the submitted work; FS, CV, AM, and JM are employed by the UK NSC; no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work.

References

    1. Richards M. Report of the independent review of adult screening programmes in England [Internet]. 2019 [cited 8 February 2021]. Available from: https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/report-of-the-inde....
    1. Armstrong D. Screening: mapping medicine's temporal spaces. Sociol Health Illn. 2012;34(2):177–193. - PubMed
    1. Raffle A.E., Mackie A., Gray J.A.M. Oxford University Press; Oxford: 2007. Screening: Evidence and Practice.
    1. Stewart S., Holland W. Radcliffe Publishing; Oxford: 2005. Screening in Disease Prevention: What Works.
    1. Public Health England. NHS population screening explained [Internet]. 2021 [cited 8 February 2021]. Available from: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/nhs-population-screening-explained.

LinkOut - more resources