. 2022 Apr 22;3(5):100329. doi: 10.1016/j.jtocrr.2022.100329

Table 3.

Reported Efficiency of Lung Cancer Screening Compared With Other Cancer Screening Programs

Cancer	Screening method	Number needed to screen to avoid one cancer death^a	Reported 95% CIs
Colorectal cancer^b	gFOBT Flexible sigmoidoscopy	377–515 864	377 (249 to 887) 515 (373 to 867) 864 (672 to 1266)
Breast cancer^c	Mammography	645–1724	645 (441 to 1389) 1724 (1176 to 3704)
Lung cancer^d	LDCT	130–320	..

CIs, confidence intervals; gFOBT, guaiac fecal occult blood testing; LDCT, low-dose computed tomography.

Will vary by screening interval selected.

Estimates for colorectal cancer vary by screening test offered: the gFOBT lower estimate reported is 377 (95% CI: 249, 887) and the upper estimate is 515 (95% CI: 373, 867). For flexible sigmoidoscopy, the estimate is 864 (95% CI: 672–1266).⁷⁴

Mammography compared with usual care: lowest estimate is for women aged 70 to 74 years (95% CI: 441, 1389), the highest estimate is 1724 for women aged 40 to 49 years (95% CI: 1176, 3704).⁷⁵

Estimates reported by the Dutch-Belgian Randomized Lung Cancer Screening Trial (NELSON) and U.S. National Lung Screening Trial.⁵^,⁶