Long-term psychosocial consequences of false-positive screening mammography

Cancer screening programs have the potential of intended beneficial effects, but they also inevitably have unintended harmful effects. In the case of screening mammography, the most frequent harm is a false-positive result. Prior efforts to measure their psychosocial consequences have been limited by short-term follow-up, the use of generic survey instruments, and the lack of a relevant benchmark-women with breast cancer.