Korea's national cancer screening: a guide

What the program is, who qualifies for each of the six screenings, how to check with NHIS, what it costs, and the parts people often get wrong.

What the program is

Korea's national cancer screening program runs under Article 11 of the Cancer Control Act. The Act leaves the details to a presidential decree, and the table that sets who gets screened and how often is Annex 1 of that decree.

Article 8 of the decree lists six cancers: stomach, liver, colorectal, breast, cervical and lung. NHIS runs the screenings for its subscribers and their dependents (National Health Insurance Act, Art. 52). Medical Aid recipients are covered too.

If you're a foreign resident enrolled in National Health Insurance, whether through work, as a regional subscriber, or as a dependent (Art. 109), you're a subscriber like anyone else. Each year NHIS sends a screening notice to the people who are due.

The six screenings

Annex 1 sets stomach screening at 40 and over, every 2 years, and colorectal at 50 and over, every year. Breast is for women 40 and over, every 2 years. Cervical is for women 20 and over, every 2 years.

Liver screening is for people 40 and over who are in the high-risk group, every 6 months. The annex defines high-risk as liver cirrhosis, hepatitis B antigen positive, hepatitis C antibody positive, or chronic liver disease caused by hepatitis B or C.

Lung screening is for people aged 54 to 74 who are in the high-risk group, every 2 years. That means current smokers with a smoking history of 30 pack-years or more, plus anyone the Minister of Health designates. Pack-years are packs a day times years smoked.

What this page does

You enter a birth year and sex, and for each of the six screenings it tells you whether your age qualifies this year, or from which year it will. Age is this year minus your birth year, which is the age you reach on your birthday. If you hit the age this very year, it flags that and tells you to confirm with NHIS.

For cervical screening it also tells you whether this is your year, because NHIS states the rule plainly: odd-year births go in odd years, even-year births in even years. We couldn't find NHIS saying the same for stomach, breast or lung, so for those it says every 2 years and leaves the exact year to NHIS.

It never decides whether you're high-risk. The calendar file adds one reminder a year to check with NHIS, with that year's list in the notes.

Checking with NHIS and getting screened

Sign in on the NHIS website and open the screening eligibility lookup to see what you're due for this year and print a confirmation. The site is in Korean. The phone line is 1577-1000.

If you're due, pick a screening clinic, book, and bring your ID. NHIS says the screening window is January 1 to December 31 every year, with no extensions.

For stomach and colorectal, if the first test shows something, you can do the second-stage test until January 31 of the next year. The clinic sends results within 15 days by mail or email.

Skips and costs

If you had a colonoscopy through national colorectal screening or covered by health insurance or Medical Aid, the Cancer Screening Standards treat you as screened through the year before the fifth anniversary of the test. In whole years, that's the year you had it plus the next four. NHIS says you can still ask to be added.

People getting special cost coverage for a cancer diagnosis are also treated as screened for that cancer through the year before their coverage ends. This page doesn't ask about that, so check with NHIS if it applies.

NHIS pays 90% and you pay 10%, except colorectal and cervical, which NHIS covers in full. If you're in the bottom 50% by premium or on Medical Aid, you pay nothing. Sedation for endoscopy or an added H. pylori test costs extra, and you pay that part.

Common mix-ups

The general health checkup and cancer screening are two different things. The general checkup is the one widely known for splitting people by even and odd birth years. Cancer screening ages and intervals come from Annex 1.

Some summaries online get the numbers wrong. One government summary card listed breast screening from 50 and lung from 50, while Annex 1 says 40 and 54. This page follows the original text only.

If you missed last year, NHIS says you can ask to be added this year, though your cost may differ. And if you had lung screening and later quit smoking, you stay eligible for 15 years after quitting, up to age 74 (Cancer Screening Standards, note 7).

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