Screening Colonoscopy Can Reduce Mortality, Study Finds

A long-term, retrospective, multicenter study in Germany followed 60 patients diagnosed with colorectal cancer (CRC) during screening colonoscopy and 252 patients during diagnostic colonoscopy in 2002, 2003, and 2004. The patients, 55 years of age or older, were followed for about a decade till 2013, with survival as the primary outcome being analyzed.

The study, published in Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, found that patients with CRC diagnosed during screening colonoscopy lived significantly longer (20.2 months longer) when compared with patients with CRC diagnosed during diagnostic colonoscopy. About 55% of the patients with diagnostic colonoscopy, and about 77% of the screening colonoscopy patients, survived beyond the time period of the study.

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