Colorectal cancer often begins as a growth called a polyp inside the colon or rectum. Finding and removing polyps can prevent colorectal cancer.
According to the National Cancer Institute, a colonoscopy is a procedure to look inside the rectum and colon for polyps, abnormal areas, or cancer.
A colonoscope is inserted through the rectum into the colon.
A colonoscope is a thin, tube-like instrument with a light and a lens for viewing. It may also have a tool to remove polyps or tissue samples, which are checked under a microscope for signs of cancer.
In a study from the University of Oslo, scientists found colonoscopy screening does not prevent colorectal cancer as well as previously assumed.
According to the study, it probably is not better than the fecal samples.
Previously, experts have assumed that the effect of using a colonoscopy to detect colorectal cancer is higher than using fecal samples. Fecal samples are used in screening programs all over the world today.
Researchers have assumed that up to 9 out of 10 colorectal cancer cases can be prevented using colonoscopy. With fecal samples, the same is assumed to be 2–3 out of 10 cases.
In the study, the researchers wanted to see if colonoscopy screening actually can help prevent colorectal cancer.
They followed 95,000 participants from four European countries over more than 10 years.
Healthy people between the age of 55 and 64 were randomized into two groups: One group was offered one screening with colonoscopy, and the other was not offered to screen at all.
All the participants in the study were followed for over 10 years, to see if colonoscopy prevents colorectal cancer.
The team found that 1.2% of the people in the study who were not randomized for colonoscopy screening got colorectal cancer after 10 years, compared to 0.98% in the group who was offered screening.
This means that new cases of colorectal cancer were reduced by 18% among the participants who were offered colonoscopy screening.
The mortality rate for colorectal cancer is generally low in the study. Only 3 out of 1,000 died from the disease during the 10 years the researchers followed the participants, regardless of if they were offered screening or not.
There was no big decrease in the mortality rate for the screening group, compared to the group that was not offered screening.
The main reason for the low mortality rates is that the treatment options for colorectal cancer have become noticeably better in the past 10 years.
This makes colonoscopy-screening less effective to prevent patients from dying from colorectal cancer.
The team says researchers and authorities should now discuss how the program should proceed from here, taking the results from the study into consideration.
If you care about health, please read studies about diet soda linked to lower death risk in colon cancer, and people need to improve their diet to prevent colon cancer.
For more information about health, please see recent studies about why aspirin can prevent colon cancer, and results showing drug combo could effectively treat this colon cancer.
The study was conducted by Michael Bretthauer et al and published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
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