Longevity & Screening

The checkups worth doing, and the hype worth skipping

Last updated: September 25, 2026

A handful of proven screenings and vaccines prevent a large share of early deaths in men. Meanwhile, the longevity industry sells expensive scans, supplements, and hormones with far less behind them. Start with your personal checklist.

Your screening checklist

Based on major U.S. guidelines for men at average risk, adjusted for the risk factors you check. Everything stays in your browser.

Your age

Check any that apply

I've ever smoked regularly
Heavy smoking history20+ pack-years (e.g. a pack a day for 20 years), and you smoke now or quit in the last 15 years.
A parent, sibling, or child had colorectal cancer
Higher prostate cancer riskBlack ancestry, a father or brother with prostate cancer, or a known BRCA or similar gene mutation.
Low testosterone, or on TRT

This covers men at average risk plus the factors above. Other conditions, such as diabetes, HIV, inflammatory bowel disease, or a personal history of cancer, change these recommendations. Use this list to start a conversation with your doctor, who can tailor it to you.

Cancer Screening for Men Colorectal, prostate (PSA), lung, skin, and testicular cancer: when to start, which test to pick, and the honest trade-offs, plus multi-cancer blood tests and full-body scans. Read the guide → Checkups & Vaccines by Age The non-cancer screenings that matter (aortic aneurysm, hepatitis C, bone density, hearing, vision) and the adult vaccine schedule, decade by decade. Read the guide → Longevity, Graded What actually extends healthy years, and an evidence check on longevity-clinic staples like HGH, peptides, NAD+, rapamycin, and "biological age" tests. Read the guide →

What screening can and can't do

Good screening finds disease early, when it's more treatable, or finds problems like precancerous polyps before they become disease at all. But more testing isn't automatically better:

False positives lead to follow-up tests, biopsies, and anxiety, each with their own risks.
Overdiagnosis means finding things, like some slow-growing prostate cancers, that would never have caused harm, and treating them anyway.
Incidental findings from broad, untargeted scans often lead to a cascade of further testing for things that turn out to be nothing.

The screenings on your checklist are the ones where large studies show the benefits outweigh those harms for people like you. That's the bar anything else should have to clear too.

The basics still do the most

No test or supplement comes close to the effect of the fundamentals: not smoking, staying active and strong, sleeping well, and keeping blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood sugar in check. Those are covered in depth elsewhere on the site:

Medical disclaimer: This page is for general education only and is not medical advice. Screening and vaccine recommendations depend on your personal and family history and change over time. Review your checklist with a licensed physician.