Chapters Transcript Video 45 is the New 50” as Age for Colorectal Cancer Screening is Lowered An important move when it comes to catching a young onset colorectal cancer earlier when it is often more treatable. We are very excited that the United States preventive services task force is lowering the recommended age at which to start screening down to 45. The United States preventive Services Task force, recognizing that something needs to be done To address the alarming increase in colorectal cancer rates among adults younger than 50 years old. Recent studies show that by 2040 colorectal cancer will be the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in this age group surpassing breast, lung and brain cancers. Previously, the American cancer society lowered its recommendation to age 45 for people at average risk, but it wasn't being routinely done or implemented largely because of barriers in terms of coverage of the screening tests from insurance companies. This move, by the task force changes that dr kim being is the director of the young onset Colorectal cancer center at Dana Farber. She applauds this move and says there's a lot more work to be done. Doctoring is lead author of an editorial published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. That says lowering the screening age will only be impactful if people follow through and get the screening. The colorectal cancer screening rate in the United States is less than 70% and even lower among the uninsured and underinsured those with low income and racial and ethnic minorities. Her editorial calls for bold steps to translate this new guideline into meaningful decreases in mortality. Doctoring also says lowering the screening age to 45 is not enough to help the growing number of patients she's seeing in their thirties or even twenties. She says research is also key to reverse this alarming trend. And then once we have knowledge of what the causes are and what the exact risk factors are, we can then take a more precision medicine approach to prevention and identify the people who do have these high risk features and target them for earlier screening Published Created by
