Endoscopic follow-up after surgery for colorectal cancer

Follow-up surgery for colorectal cancer is recommended. The yield of endoscopy is unknown and was therefore studied.

Patients with colorectal cancer in the years 2003, 2004 and 2005 were included. Evaluation was done in July 2014.

Cancer was diagnosed in 267 patients. These were divided into three groups: group 1—still alive (n = 88), group 2—died within 1 year after diagnosis (n = 67), and group 3—died more than 1 year after diagnosis (n = 112). Patients in group 3 showed a trend towards non-cancer-related death (p = 0.06). Endoscopic follow-up was done in 101 patients (37.6 %). Patients still alive underwent more often follow-up colonoscopy (p < 0.001). Patients still alive had more often synchronous polyps detected during index endoscopy compared with patients of groups 2 and 3 (p = 0.03). Follow-up revealed more often new polyp(s) (p = 0.006). If no polyps were seen during the time of diagnosing cancer, follow-up endoscopy detected polyp(s) in 26 % of cases. Two newly developed cancers in group 1 and three in group 3 were diagnosed.

Endoscopic follow-up after curative surgery for colorectal cancer has a high diagnostic yield. Whether detection and removal of polyps increases survival is not yet clear.