False negative fecal occult blood test may be associated with increased mortality from colorectal cancer.

Dig Dis Sci

Department of Gatroenterology and Hepatology, Meir Medical Center and Sackler School of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel.

Published: September 2013

Background: Fecal Occult Blood Test (FOBT) is an accepted screening test for colorectal cancer (CRC). It has been shown to decrease mortality by up to 30%. The outcome of screening failures has not been adequately studied.

Aims: The purpose of this study was to assess the outcome of patients who were diagnosed with CRC after a false negative FOBT.

Methods: We identified all consecutive CRCs from pathology reports between 2005 and 2010. Patients were divided according to their FOBT result. Those who became positive were compared to patients who remained negative.

Results: Altogether 401 CRCs were identified. Of those, 202 never performed a FOBT. At least one negative FOBT was performed by 133 individuals (67%). Of these, 76 remained negative (false negatives, FN) and 57 became positive (positive conversion, PC, controls). The prevalence of metastatic disease was threefold higher among the FNs as compared to the PC group (16 [22.2%] vs. 4 [7.5%], P=0.022). All-cause mortality was also significantly higher among FNs versus PCs (24 [31.6%] vs. 5 [8.8%], P=0.001); in Cox regression analysis of survival (covariates: FNs vs. PC, gender, age, medications and co-morbidities) FNs had increased mortality compared to the PC (HR 2.929, P=0.033, CI 95% 1.092-7.858). No statistically significant difference was found regarding all primary end points when comparing the FN and the "No test" group.

Conclusion: These data disclose a particular risk of FOBT as a screening test. A subgroup of patients with "false" negative tests may have increased morbidity and mortality. Efforts should be made to recognize and characterize this high-risk group.

Download full-text PDF

Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10620-013-2702-1DOI Listing

Publication Analysis

Top Keywords

false negative
8
fecal occult
8
occult blood
8
blood test
8
increased mortality
8
colorectal cancer
8
screening test
8
higher fns
8
mortality
5
fobt
5

Similar Publications

While current guidelines recommend R2* method as the first-line method for liver iron concentration (LIC) measurement, its diagnostic accuracy is debatable. A prior meta-analysis suggested limited accuracy of R2* method for identifying patients with iron overload. However, substantial advances in R2* method over the past decade may have improved its diagnostic performance.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: Artificial intelligence (AI) tools for histological diagnosis offer great potential to healthcare, yet failure to understand their clinical context is delaying adoption. IGUANA (Interpretable Gland-Graphs using a Neural Aggregator) is an AI algorithm that can effectively classify colonic biopsies into normal versus abnormal categories, designed to automatically report normal cases. We performed a retrospective pathological and clinical review of the errors made by IGUANA.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: Even though the prevalence of malignancy within gastric ulcers is low, surveillance endoscopy is routinely performed after gastric ulcer diagnosis resulting in unnecessary costs and risks. Endoscopic appearance may be used to identify ulcers with malignant features and guide decisions regarding the need for surveillance endoscopy. Our aim was to assess the predictive value of several endoscopic ulcer features with the risk of prevalent malignancy in patients diagnosed with gastric ulcers.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Diffusion weighted MRI (DWI) has emerged as a promising adjunct to reduce unnecessary biopsies prompted by breast MRI through use of apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) measures. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of different lesion ADC measurement approaches and ADC cutoffs on the diagnostic performance of breast DWI in a high-risk MRI screening cohort to identify the optimal approach for clinical incorporation.

Methods: Consecutive screening breast MRI examinations (August 2014-Dec 2018) that prompted a biopsy for a suspicious breast lesion (BI-RADS 4 or 5) were retrospectively evaluated.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Enhanced detection for antibiotic resistance genes in wastewater samples using a CRISPR-enriched metagenomic method.

Water Res

December 2024

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Grainger College of Engineering, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA; Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA; Carle Illinois College of Medicine, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA.

The spread of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) in the environment is a global public health concern. To date, over 5000 genes have been identified to express resistance to antibiotics. ARGs are usually low in abundance for wastewater samples, making them difficult to detect.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?

Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!