Image courtesy of Shutterstock
Italian researchers have screened more than 5000 heavy smokers over the last fifteen years, using CT scans to detect lung cancer early. While the proactive CT screening of smokers has been good at discovering developing cancer tumours, finding them more frequently than expected, the programmes have not had a clear effect on reducing deaths from cancer. The research team decided to look at whether the way different genes were expressed in various tumours could account for why some people survived and others did not, despite the early detection by the screening program.