Research In Brief
This article was originally published in The Gray Sheet
Executive Summary
Colonoscopy overuse: Surveillance colonoscopy is cost-effective for patients at high-risk for colorectal cancer, but aggressive surveillance may be too costly and/or harmful, a study published in the June issue of Gastroenterology concludes. "Efforts should be made to improve risk models for colonic neoplasia," a research team led by Sameer Dev Saini, University of Michigan, writes. The study modeled a cohort of 50-year-old patients with newly diagnosed adenomas, who were followed until death, with the assumption that 30% of those patients were high-risk. The data show that performing a colonoscopy every 4 years in high-risk patients, and every 10 years in low-risk patients was more costly but also more effective than no surveillance. Performing colonoscopy in low-risk patients, every 5 years is more costly and marginally more effective, but an every-three-years strategy was not only cost-ineffective but potentially harmful, they found