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Professor David Whynes and colleagues from the United Kingdom reported the causes of, and ages at, death of subjects in an English colorectal cancer screening trial.
The research team analyzed 78,708 deaths occurring between 1981 and 2008, within the Nottingham randomised controlled trial of biennial faecal occult blood testing.
The team's main outcome measures included Cause of death, age at death by sex and by cause.
The research team noted that significantly more subjects died from verified colorectal cancer in the trial's control group than in the intervention group.
For no other major cause of death was the difference in proportion across the two groups statistically significant.
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| Subjects receiving negative test results lived significantly longer |
| Gut |
The research team observed that age at death was lower for cancer than for other principal causes, except for ischemic heart disease among women.
However, mean age at death was higher for colorectal cancer than for other cancers, except for prostate cancer among men.
The researchers noted that increasing levels of material deprivation significantly lowered the expected ages at death, independently of cause.
For both men and women, the team found that the mean age at death from all causes for screening participants was higher than that of controls and non-participants.
Mean deprivation was lowest among participants.
Of those participating in screening, and dying from colorectal cancer, subjects receiving negative test results lived significantly longer than those who received positive test results.
However, if dying from other causes, they died at an earlier age.
Professor Whynes' team concludes, "The age at death from colorectal cancer is higher than that of most other cancers."
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