The excess burden of side-effects from treatment in men allocated to screening for prostate cancer. The Göteborg randomised population-based prostate cancer screening trial

Despite the relatively high risk of erectile dysfunction and incontinence following radical prostatectomy for prostate cancer, the excess burden of permanent side-effects after population-based screening can be regarded as relatively low, when related to the number of men saved from prostate cancer death. These data can be useful when calculating the harms and benefits of screening. However, the outcome on a population-level may differ from the benefit for the individual.