Current principles of colorectal cancer screening – from opportunistic screening to a population-based screening program

Czech version

Authors: T. Grega ¹; O. Májek ²; O. Ngo ²; N. Král ³; B. Seifert ³; L. Dušek ²; M. Zavoral ¹; Š. Suchánek ¹
Authors‘ workplace: Interní klinika 1. LF UK a ÚVN – VFN v Praze ¹; Institut biostatistiky a analýz, LF a PřF MU, Brno ²; Ústav všeobecného lékařství, 1. LF UK v Praze ³
Published in: Gastroent Hepatol 2016; 70(5): 383-392
Category: Gastrointestinal Oncology: Review Article
doi: https://doi.org/10.14735/amgh2016383

Overview

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second leading cause of death from malignancy all over the world. Annually, approximately 8,000 patients are newly diagnosed with this cancer and about 4,000 patients die because of this disease in the Czech Republic. Due to the nature of the disease, it can be prevented by various screening methods. The National Czech CRC screening program has been running since 2000 and is focused on asymptomatic individuals aged over 50 years. In 2014, the program began to send personal invitations to the CRC screening target population. The basic screening methods include the fecal occult blood test and colonoscopy. While colonoscopy is considered to be the gold standard, compliance in asymptomatic individuals for this procedure is less than the recommended 50%. One reason for this might be the invasiveness of this examination. Therefore, non-invasive fecal occult blood tests are used. New alternative screening methods are being sought that are less invasive with high sensitivity and adequate acceptance by the general population. Such methods are DNA stool tests, sigmoidoscopy, computed tomography colonography, and capsule colonoscopy. In this article, CRC epidemiology, alternative screening examinations, and the results of the national CRC screening program (including personal invitations) are discussed.

Key words:
colorectal cancer – epidemiology – interval cancer – population screening – colonoscopy – fecal occult blood test – CT colonography – capsule colonoscopy

The authors declare they have no potential conflicts of interest concerning drugs, products, or services used in the study.

The Editorial Board declares that the manuscript met the ICMJE „uniform requirements“ for biomedical papers.

Submitted:
5. 9. 2016

Accepted:
3. 10. 2016

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