The American Cancer Society, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force and many gastroenterologists still recommend adults undergo colon cancer screenings starting at age 45. But the first randomized investigation into whether colonoscopies successfully detect the disease is causing Americans to wonder whether they’ve been enduring the unpleasant procedure unnecessarily.
The study of more than 84,500 men and women from Poland, Norway and Sweden found only an 18 percent risk of colon cancer after 10 years among those randomly invited to have a camera explore their intestines. These results, published in the New England Journal of Medicine in October, surprised even the study’s principal investigator.
There’s no doubt that colon cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer death in the U.S. But for the countries represented in this study, colonoscopies are not part of standard care the way they are in the U.S. Only 42 percent of the adults (aged 55 ...
