Heart screening tests could be a waste of money, study warns

Heart screening tests offered to all adults aged between 40 and 74 could be a waste of money, according to a new study.

Cambridge University researchers writing in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) said the £250 million screening programme would be much more effective if it targeted high-risk patients, rather than scanning everybody.

The Department of Health scheme is aimed to detect early signs of heart disease, strokes, type two diabetes and kidney disease, but is yet to be fully rolled out in England.

Simon Griffin of the epidemiology unit of Britain’s Medical Research Council, who led the study, said: “A universal screening programme for cardiovascular disease might prevent an important number of new cardiovascular events… but it may be unrealistic to implement in increasingly resource-constrained health systems.”

Commenting on the findings, Judy O’Sullivan, senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation, agreed it is important that the NHS finds a cost-effective method of screening, but one that is still able to reach poor and disadvantaged patients.