# Studies find colon cancer screening cost effective



## Guest (Oct 19, 2000)

Screening for colon cancer effective and affordableNEW YORK, Oct 17 (Reuters Health) - Although they may support different methods, researchers agree that it makes medical and financial sense to screen everyone over the age of 50 for cancer of the colon and rectum.Colorectal cancer, as it is known, will cause an estimated 56,300 deaths in 2000, the American Cancer Society predicts, which correlates to about 11% of cancer deaths.Because recent recommendations offer a choice of screening methods, Dr. A. Lindsay Frazier from Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts and colleagues, and Dr. Amnon Sonnenberg from the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico and associates conducted separate studies of the relative costs and effectiveness of the different methods.In the first study, published in the October 18th issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association, the most effective screening method combined testing of the stool for blood and performing sigmoidoscopy (looking into the colon with a lighted, snakelike instrument) every year. This method, at a cost of $92,900 per year of life gained, reduced the cancer rate by 60% and the colon cancer death rate by 80%.The results of the second study, published in the October 17th Annals of Internal Medicine, supported colonoscopy (more extensive than sigmoidoscopy, but otherwise similar) every 10 years as the preferred screening method. With a 75% cancer prevention rate, the authors report, colonoscopy would cost just under $11,000 per year of life saved, compared with the next best method.The difference in the preferred method depends largely upon how the public actually behaves in the face of recommendations, both research groups indicate. If individuals fail to comply with the guidelines, more expensive (but more effective at detection) methods like colonoscopy become less costly overall. In fact, both teams agree that colonoscopy emerges as the best method for colon cancer screening if as few as 60% of people were to get their stool tested annually."Given the low proportion of Americans who currently comply with the recommended screening schedule," Frazier and associates conclude, "advising all Americans to be screened at least once (with colonoscopy) may be a reasonable starting point for national policy."SOURCE: The Journal of the American Medical Association 2000;284:1954-1961; Annals of Internal Medicine 2000;133:573-584, 647-649.


----------



## JeanG (Oct 20, 1999)

Thanks for posting this, Guy. Now if they could only make people more aware of how important this is.JeanG


----------



## moldie (Sep 25, 1999)

Another advantage of the newly tauted DNA stool testing that I posted about today is that it should be cheaper in the long term than a colonoscopy (at least that is what they said). In this case if the screening is found to be effective, most of those with primarily "benign" conditions like IBS would not have to go through a colonoscopy. If this would be the case, it would be great! However, they caution that you should not put it off in the meantime until it is an accepted practice.


----------

