Associate Professor, Brian Cox has said that the screening of prostate cancer should be reduced in New Zealand. Professor Cox has appealed to the Ministry of Health and Cancer Control, New Zealand to take appropriate actions to stop testing men without the symptoms of the disease.

Professor Cox said that the long-term Swedish controlled trials on prostate screening have shown that screening does not reduce the mortality rate of prostate cancer patients to a significant extent. The study has also claimed that it’s improper to examine men, who have no symptoms of the disease. The study evaluated 9,000 Swedish men for more than 20 years.

The only method used to detect the prostate cancer is a blood test known as, PSA testing. The test helps in detecting prostate cancer sooner because of the increased level of blood. Doctors have suggested that the best way to detect prostate cancer is to combine the blood test with a physical examination.

The oncology experts believe that it’s too early to call the prostate specific antigen (PSA) blood testing as useless. For past many years it is the only method available for the detection of the disease.