Project Details
Reduction of colorectal cancer incidence and mortality after endoscopic screening and evaluation of risk-adapted screening strategies
Subject Area
Epidemiology and Medical Biometry/Statistics
Term
from 2002 to 2017
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5360507
In the DACHS study, colorectal cancer patients and control persons without colorectal cancer are recruited in the entire Rhine-Neckar-Odenwald region since 2003. All 22 clinics in the region offering primary treatment of patients with colorectal cancer participate in recruitment for the study. Controls in this population-based case-control study are selected according to the distribution of age, sex and place of residence of the cases (using frequency matching) via population registries. Recruitment includes an extensive personal interview by trained interviewers and the donation of a blood sample. Medical records including detailed information on cancer diagnosis (cases) and reports of previous large bowel endoscopies (for validation of self-reports, cases and controls) are obtained from the physicians of the participants.During the preceding funding period, the applicants have substantially expanded the database of the DACHS study, and they have used this database for a variety of analyses on reduction of colorectal cancer incidence after colonoscopy in Germany which received much attention in the scientific community and in the formulation and update of national and international screening guidelines. The applicants have furthermore initiated and established a systematic follow-up of cases with respect to cause-specific mortality. This follow-up application aims to enable further in-depth analyses on reduction of colorectal cancer incidence in an extended dataset of 5,000 colorectal cancer patients and 5,000 controls. It shall furthermore enable to conduct, for the first time, in-depth analyses on reduction of colorectal cancer mortality - the ultimate and most significant goal of colorectal cancer screening. The focus of this project will be on detailed analyses on reduction of colorectal cancer incidence and mortality for specific risk groups, which are enabled for the first time due to the substantially increased sample size and the meanwhile established mortality follow-up of the study population and which are essential for future development of evidence-based, risk-adapted and cost-effective colorectal cancer screening strategies.In summary, the proposal has the following objectives:1. Detailed analyses on the reduction of colorectal cancer incidence following endoscopic screening and potential implications for the optimization of colorectal cancer screening in terms of evidence-based, risk-adapted screening strategies.2. First analyses on the reduction of colorectal cancer mortality following endoscopic screening and potential implications for the optimization of colorectal cancer screening in terms of evidence-based, risk-adapted screening strategies.
DFG Programme
Research Grants
Participating Person
Privatdozent Michael Hoffmeister, Ph.D.