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| Bowel program works, but needs men |
26-Oct-2007 |
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By Bianca Nogrady
THE first year of the National Bowel Cancer Screening Program has been encouraging, although issues such as a poorer male participation rate and delay in colonoscopy follow-up are yet to be resolved, a leading gastroenterologist says.
About 156,000 Australians took part in the first stage of the faecal occult blood test-based screening program, returning 11,000 positive tests and leading to the diagnosis of more than 100 suspected cancers, according to data released at the Australian gastroenterology week conference in Perth last week.
Professor Finlay Macrae, spokesman for the Gastroenterological Society of Australia and professor of colorectal medicine and genetics at RoyalMelbourneHospital, said the national participation rate was 41%, a figure that compared favourably with early stages of the breast and cervical cancer screening programs.
However, 20% fewer men participated than women, despite them being at greater risk of the disease.
"This is partly because this is the first national screening program for cancer that involves males, so they haven't been sensitised to the idea of cancer screening," Professor Macrae said. "It will take longer for them to understand what the process is."Strategies to increase male and general participation rates, including greater involvement of GPs, were being explored, Professor Macrae said.
Timely access to colonoscopy was another unresolved issue highlighted in the earlier pilot studies, where patients with a positive result waited an average of 38.5 days for a follow-up colonoscopy.
Read more of this story in
Australian Doctor
next week.
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