SynthesisAnnals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England2019
Safe investigation of isolated change in bowel habit with a flexible sigmoidoscopy? A systematic review and meta-analysis.
Synthesis in Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Factors Affecting Adherence to National Colorectal Cancer Screening: A 12-Year Longitudinal Study Using Multi-Institutional Pooled Data in Korea.Journal of Korean medical science · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionPublic awareness campaigns have led to increasing referrals of patients to colorectal surgery for possible cancer. Change in bowel habit, is traditionally described as a symptom of a left sided bowel cancer. If this is the case in practice, it raises the potentially attractive option of investigating such patients with flexible sigmoidoscopy only. This study sought to systematically review the literature describing tumour location of patients with bowel cancer presenting with left-sided symptoms to establish the safety of potential investigation of these patients with flexible sigmoidoscopy alone.
methodsA systematic review of studies reporting both the presenting symptoms of patients with bowel cancer and the location of their cancer in the bowel was prospectively registered (CRD42017072492). MEDLINE, EMBASE and CENTRAL were searched with no date or language restriction.
resultsSeven studies were included. Isolated change in bowel habit (with or without rectal bleeding) was a presenting symptom of 73% (95% CI 41-96%, I2 = 99%) of left-sided cancers but also in 13% (95% CI 2-30%, I2 = 96%) of right-sided cancers. In all patients with cancer who presented with isolated change in bowel habit (with or without rectal bleeding), the cancer was right sided in 8% (95% CI 4-12%, I2 = 69%).
conclusionsThere is a higher than expected risk that if a cancer is diagnosed in a patient presenting with either an isolated change in bowel habit or a combination of change in bowel habit with rectal bleeding, the cancer may be right sided.
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