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Review
. 2021 Jul;54(4):499-504.
doi: 10.5946/ce.2020.245-IDEN. Epub 2021 Mar 15.

Current Status of Colorectal Cancer and Its Public Health Burden in Thailand

Kasenee Tiankanon  1   2 , Satimai Aniwan  1   2 , Rungsun Rerknimitr  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Current Status of Colorectal Cancer and Its Public Health Burden in Thailand

Kasenee Tiankanon et al. Clin Endosc. 2021 Jul.

Abstract

Colorectal cancer (CRC) accounts for approximately 10.3% of new cancer cases in Thailand and is currently the 3rd most prevalent cancer found among the Thai population. Starting in 2017, the Thai government announced the national CRC screening program as a response to this important issue. Among the 70 million people currently residing in Thailand, 14 million require screening, while there are approximately a total of 1,000 endoscopists available to perform colonoscopy. Due to the limited resources and shortage of endoscopists in Thailand, applying a population-based one-step colonoscopy program as a primary screening method is not feasible. To reduce colonoscopy workload, with the help of others, including village health volunteers, institution-based health personnel, reimbursement coders, pathologists, and patients due for CRC screening, a two-step approach of one-time fecal immunochemical test (FIT), which prioritizes and filters out subjects for colonoscopy, is chosen. Moreover, additional adjustments to the optimal FIT cutoff value and the modified Asia-Pacific Colorectal Screening risk score, including body weight, were proposed to stratify the priority of colonoscopy schedule. This article aims to give an overview of the past and current policy developmental strategies and the current status of the Thailand CRC screening program.

Keywords: Colon cancer; Colon cancer screening; Colonoscopy; FIT; Fecal immunochemical test.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of Interest: Rungsun Rerknimitr has been an Editorial Board member of Clinical Endoscopy; however, he was not involved in the peer reviewer selection, evaluation, or decision process of this article. Otherwise, no other potential conflicts of interest relevant to this article was reported.

Figures

Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
Bowel preparation quality introduction by medical personnel.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
Mass screening colonoscopy with 100 procedures per day.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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