SAGES Joins Pilot to Improve Colorectal Cancer Screening Rates, Access to Specialty Care in Community Health Centers
SAGES has joined with the American Cancer Society and the National Colorectal Cancer Roundtable to implement a colorectal cancer screening pilot program in underserved communities.
The program is part of NCCR’s effort to reach the goal of 80 percent of adults 50 and over receiving regular screening for colorectal cancer by 2018. Â Pilots will be launched in South Carolina, Connecticut and Minnesota.
SAGES played an instrumental role helping to define the problem, craft the grant process, and educate roundtable participants that general surgeons provide the majority of colonoscopy screening in underserved communities in the US.
“We are honored to be a part of this national roundtable of foremost experts in the field of colon cancer prevention and treatment,” said Dr. Michael Brunt, SAGES President. “Early screening is essential to prevention and colorectal cancer is the only one of the five most common cancers that can actually be prevented by screening.
According to Dr. Brian Dunkin, SAGES President-Elect, “This pilot program will help to bring services to communities most in need, and SAGES has committed to helping to identify surgical endoscopists within our rank that are willing to provide colonoscopy screening to the underserved at these healthcare clinics.”