Screening for gallbladder cancer

This page tells you about screening for gallbladder cancer. Screening means testing for early stages of a disease before there are any symptoms.

Before doctors can screen for any type of cancer, they must have an accurate test to use. The test must be reliable in picking up cancers that are there. And it must not give false positive results in people who do not have cancer. At the moment, we don’t have a suitable test to use for gallbladder cancer screening.

The only way to screen for gallbladder cancer would be to do an ERCP test or endoscopic ultrasound. For these tests, you first have a drug to make you sleepy (a sedative). Then the doctor puts a tube down your throat, through your stomach and out into your duodenum (an endoscopy). As galbladder cancer is so rare, many people would have these tests unnecessarily if they were used for screening. The tests can cause harm to some people and so would not be acceptable because

• There would be a very small chance of finding a cancer for any one person
• You cannot eat for 8 hours before the tests
• You often have to stay in hospital overnight afterwards
• The tests are more likely to cause bowel damage (although this is rare) than to find a gallbladder cancer

There is no screening programme for gallbladder cancer in the UK at the moment because

• There are high costs involved
• A very low number of cancers would be found
• The tests have risks that outweigh the benefits for most people

So this not a reasonable approach for seemingly healthy people.

With uncommon diseases, it is most cost effective to screen people who are thought to be at a higher risk of the particular disease. But first we must be sure we know who is at higher risk. If you think you may be at higher than average risk of gallbladder cancer, talk to your doctor. For example, you may have a medical condition that increases risk. If you are really at higher risk, your doctor may be able to give you regular check ups from time to time.