# Decisions about Cancer Screening in Alzheimer's Disease

> **NIH NIH R01** · INDIANA UNIVERSITY INDIANAPOLIS · 2020 · $468,680

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract:
The incidence of both Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (AD) and of breast cancer increases with
age; thus, many older women with AD are faced with questions about breast cancer screening. Having AD
impacts a woman’s life expectancy and their ability to participate in her medical decision-making about breast
cancer screening. As a result, AD family caregivers are frequently involved in making decisions about
mammography. Each year over 800,000 older women with AD receive screening mammography. Caregivers
cite decision-making and procedures related to mammograms as particularly stressful and there is no data that
mammography screening helps women with AD live longer or better.
No randomized trials evaluating the benefits and harms of mammography screening include women with AD
and current guidelines recommend not screening women with a life expectancy of <10 years. The rationale is
that these women will not live long enough to experience the life prolonging benefits of mammography
screening. Instead, screening these women can put them at risk for physical and psychological harm as a
result of overdiagnosis, overtreatment, additional tests due to false positives, and the identification of clinically
unimportant cancer. Conversely, while mammography screening may not help older women with AD live
longer, it may help find breast cancers earlier when they are easier to treat. Therefore, it is important that
women with AD and their caregivers have information to make an informed decision about screening.
Decision aids have promise to improve the quality of medical decision-making for patients with AD and inform
family caregivers about the risks, benefits, and choices about screening mammography in this population. Our
team has created and evaluated a mammogram decision aid for use with caregivers of older women with AD.
This decision aid includes specific information about the relationship between life expectancy with AD and
benefit from mammograms, the impact of mammography on quality of life for older women with AD, and a
recognition of the emotions and experience of caregivers when making decisions about mammography for a
relative with AD.
We are proposing the Decisions about Cancer screening in Alzheimer's Disease (DECAD) study, as the first
study to test if an evidence-based decision aid for AD caregivers can support decision-making about
mammography and improve the quality of medical decision-making about breast cancer screening. This large
randomized controlled trial will recruit 426 dyads of older women with AD and a family caregiver from 24
primary care practices in central Indiana to test this decision aid.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9924427
- **Project number:** 5R01AG055424-04
- **Recipient organization:** INDIANA UNIVERSITY INDIANAPOLIS
- **Principal Investigator:** Nicole R. Fowler
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $468,680
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-09-30 → 2022-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9924427

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9924427, Decisions about Cancer Screening in Alzheimer's Disease (5R01AG055424-04). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9924427. Licensed CC0.

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