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Hi, I'm Dr. Joanne Schottinger. I'm a medical oncologist for
Southern California Permanente Medical Group.
Colon cancer is a very common cancer that is diagnosed about
150,000 times each year in the United States.
Over the course of the lifetime about five percent of Americans,
that's about 1 in 20, will be diagnosed with colon cancer.
Colon cancer is a cancer that we can screen very effectively for,
but it is also a cancer that can be prevented with a screening
test in the sense that polyps and early pre-malignant growths
can be taken out and removed at the time of screening so that
you never actually develop cancer.
Men and women are both at risk for colon cancer.
Generally the age where we recommend screening is between
the ages of 50 and 75.
That's where most of the disease occurs.
But there are certain people who are
at much higher risk for colon cancer,
either because they have a strong family history,
or they have conditions like colitis
that put them at a higher risk.
And in those people screening would be recommended
at an earlier age and more frequently.
There are many different ways that you
can be screened for colon cancer.
Probably the three most common ways are with a colonoscopy or
with a sigmoidoscopy, or with a test that's called a FIT test.
A fecal-immunal-chemical test.
Colonoscopy is a test that's performed by inserting
a tube with a light on it, into the ***
and it examines the entire colon.
This is done by a gastroenterologist,
a GI specialist, and it's the most
invasive of the three tests.
The big advantage of colonoscopy is that it can find polyps and
remove them before they become malignant.
Now if a polyp is taken out or a polyp of some concern,
a larger polyp or something with pre-malignant changes.
You might need the colonoscopy more frequently.
Maybe every three to five years.
But in general for a normal colonoscopy
in an average risk person, once every ten years
is all you need. A sigmoidoscomy is similar to a colonoscopy,
but it only goes about a third of the way up into the colon.
It does have the same advantage in that
it can find and remove polyps.
But the entire colon is not examined.
A sigmoidoscopy has to be repeated every five years and
some people combine a sigmoidoscopy with
the FIT test so that they're examining part of the colon
with a sigmoidoscopy and another part with the FIT.
So a FIT test is a fecal-immunal-chemical test
that looks for blood in the feces, in the stool
or the poop. In many ways, it is the simplest test
that can be done that is completely painless that can be
done in the comfort and the convenience of your own home.
It involves taking a small sampling tube,
and this little wand is inserted into the stool that comes out of
your toilet bowl, placed back in.
And this can either be returned to the doctor's office
by yourself or in the mail.
We all have to poop at least once a day.
Almost everybody goes once a day.
So it's a very easy way to get tested for colon cancer with
some poop that was just going to be flushed.
It is also a test that you have to do once a year.
Colon cancer, like many cancers, is nasty if it's caught late.
About two thirds of people who are diagnosed with colon cancer
do survive colon cancer, but if you can pick it up early
in a stage 0 or 1, that number shoots up to over 90 percent
of people will survive and do well.