FRIDAY, May 26 (HealthDay News) -- Virtual colonoscopy, or computed tomographic colonography (CTC), is nearly as effective as standard colonoscopy in detecting polyps in patients at average risk of colon cancer, according to a report presented at Digestive Disease Week 2006 in Los Angeles.
Brooks Cash, M.D., of the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., reported on 760 patients who have undergone CTC. If the CTC found a polyp larger than 10 mm or more than three polyps larger than 6 mm, the patient had same-day optical colonoscopy. Those with one or two polyps measuring 6 mm to 9 mm had optical colonoscopy after a year, and those with no polyps larger than 6 mm had optical colonoscopy within five years.
Cash found that CTC is comparable in accuracy to optical colonoscopy in finding polyps larger than 10 mm. Overall, the detection sensitivity was 96.4 percent compared to 96.3 percent with optical colonoscopy. CTC gets less sensitive as polyp sizes get smaller. For polyps 6 to 9 mm, CTC had a sensitivity of 77.3 percent and a specificity of 85 percent, while optical colonoscopy had a specificity of 88.2 percent.
"For patients who are not at high risk for colon cancer or who do not have alarming signs or symptoms, CTC is an effective method to screen for precancerous colorectal lesions at our institution," Cash said in a statement.
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